Back at it

Its Monday, but not just any Monday, the first Monday back after the Christmas Holiday. My company was gracious enough, since Christmas fell upon a Thursday this year, to give us Friday off with pay. I know of other companies that required the Friday off, but also forced employee’s to use their own paid time off or vacation, so I am very thankful for that. This company, in this time of economic recession and all, was able to provide the entire company a paid day off, what a blessing.
Also, it is a depressing Monday, as the regular football season has ended. Don’t get me wrong, the playoffs are very awesome and I am looking forward to them, but my beloved Seahawks did not make it this year. Plagued by injuries, they were only able to make 4 wins this season, their worst in 10 years. It happens to the best, just look at the Detroit Lions, 0-16, the worst record ever in football hsitory, wow!
Anyway, just wanted to welcome everyone back to the office and I wish you all a great day!

~Blog On

Winter Wonderland Begins

Well, everyone else in Seattle is talking about it so I might as well jump on the bandwagon, lol. It is snowing! That’s right… snowing… at zero elevation. The important thing is that it is currently not sticking, but then again, this is Seattle, not at home, in higher elevation and different climate! What does this mean??? Traffic is going to suck worse than it already does. Buckle up people… take it slow… don’t panic… turn INTO your slide to regain control of your vehicle, and most importantly… don’t get me killed! =D Until next time!

~Blog on

Crisis Core

I DID IT!!!!!!! I beat Crisis Core on my PSP. What an interesting game. I got hooked on it and just couldn’t put it down. The actual story mode was great, especially for a PSP game. It had cut scenes that were animated, the graphics were insanely awesome, the game play was great, not to mention the challenge of Materia Fusion. There are many optional missions you can do to further enhance your characters’ abilities and by the time you get to the last string of missions, the story mode is so easy its almost not even fun. I chose to go for full completion of the game which means I would have to tough it out through all 300 missions of the game, the last of which contains a boss that has been critically acclaimed as the toughest boss in Final Fantasy history. In order to beat this boss, you have to max out your stats and basically obtain God-like status to even stand a chance. Once I took her down, the final stage of the game was so easy that the final boss didn’t even get an attack off on me before falling to my sword!
I was excited but at the same time, I felt disappointed. I would have rather the game required you to finish the story mode prior to the optional missions quest as only the true hardcore Final Fantasy lover’s would pursue that way the final levels would actually pose a challenge.
I like that after the game ended, it provided an option to save and start a “game +” mode allowing to restart the game on “hard” mode to make it harder and more challenging increasing enemy stats and enhancing the AI. Again, my problem with this is it allows you to keep your level, stats, materia, etc. You can have maxed out everything and start the game over keeping it all. Where is the fun in that? I gave this a shot and was quickly bored almost half-way through the game due to the fact that one maybe two strikes with the sword and even “tough” enemy’s are done for.
I really enjoyed the playability and all that jazz and I will gladly start over from scratch and play this game over and over! Until next time!

~Blog on

Home at last

Sony has finally done it… they announced the release of the HOME network. As a PS3 owner going on 2 years this month (that’s right, I got it when it first came out) I have been reading and waiting for this since summer of 07, but the waiting is over! Tomorrow when Sony releases its weekly updates on the Playstation Network, it will be mine, muuuhhuuaawwwaaahahahahaha! For those who are not in the know or are simply unaware of what this is, I reccomened having a look here.  Until Next Time!
~Blog on

Counting down

December 1st, the official beginning of the last month of the calendar year.  Also, the realization that Christmas is only 24 days away.  3 weeks, 3 days from this very moment, families will either have already opened gifts or be sharing the joy of the spirit of Christmas. What is scary about this… these last 3 weeks go by in the blink of an eye and being the procrastinator that I am, I have yet to get my shop on.  This will be a rare year where I am actually able to buy gifts for my immediate family and I am thrilled about it.  The problem for me is what do I get them?  Do I just get them gift cards? 
I experimented on my older sister last month for her birthday, getting her a $20 gift card to her favorite coffee stand.  She seemed to appreciate it but she wasn’t really excited.  Getting a gift card to a store is different at Christmas becasue you can take advantage of the post Christmas specials and get more bang for your buck, something I highly advocate.  This does not go well for small children; however, it is their passion to traditionally rip open gift after gift covering the floor with all sorts of wrapping paper to the point where all but the last opened gift is no longer visible.  The smile on their face, the happiness of that very moment, I have never seen a small child so happy to clean up a mess due to the euphoria and excitement of their new toys, books, games, gadgets, and gizmos.
And so it begins, the Christmas countdown… the planning of when do I get together with my family, my siblings, my friends, my co-workers, etc?  Just remember as we put 2008 to rest to take it easy and relax, this year is almost over, lets be sure to finish it well because it will be over before we know it. Until next time

~Blog on