What Can I Say?

Acutally, quite a bit...

First, Birthday Countdown Hits Critical!

I would like to take a moment to explain how things work. First of all, as few of you are aware, my day job is in retail management, which means that once in a while I need to close my store, and I work every other weekend. I have my daughters Monday through Friday, my ex-wife takes them on Thursday evenings, which is the night I have chosen to close, Friday night I drive them back to their Mom's place which is about 45 min. from here.

So, with my birthday on Friday, and my daughters wanting to have a party, we were forced to have a small family get together tonight.

We met at my Grandmother's apartment in Anoka, which is right across the river from where I live. It was nothing fancy, just cake and a few presents. I've already gotten my present from me mum and gramma, which is the Coffee Maker I showed you a short time ago. My daughters both used their own money and bought me a bag of Easter Kit-Kats and a Stewie Griffin Bendable Keychain, my ex-wife chipped in and got me a $10 gift card to Target, and had the girls sign their names to it.

The highlight, however, was the cake that my Mom helped the girls make for me:


mmmm CAEK!!! CAEK! CAEK!!!!!

I really don't 'celebrate' my birthday much anymore, having long since reached that age of 'not caring' much. But, I'm not opposed to people buying me drinks and things... because, I like drinks, and things.

Anyway, that's all I really had on that.... on to the stuff that you probably came for...


Nostalgia + Movies = x
Solve for x...

Transformers

In the vein of nostalgic, or perhaps the more acceptable term in this case would be "retro", Michael Bay's Transformers is one that I'm really looking forward to.

Here's the deal, modern CGI has come to a point that it's getting harder and harder for those of us that grew up loving some of the (frequently horribly) animated shows to not want to see them re-done in more updated beauty. It's the same with many of the old rubber monster movies of the days of yore, as witnessed with Godzilla.

However, it brings us to an age old argument: Just because a thing can be done, should it?

I've waffled a lot over the years as I've seen this done over and over again. I can't claim that I haven't watched most of the almost ludicrous number of 'remakes' that have come and flopped their way through the box office over the years. I try, generally, to go into it with a 'fresh perspective', trying hard to see the film as something NEW, if not different. This tactic has worked in most cases.

So, there's been a number of 'unauthorized' photos that have cropped up on this great internet where we dwell, and, most of those have been met with a great deal of criticism. Something I'm not surprised about, when you take something that has been loved, idealized and followed by many with an almost cult like draw, of course it's going to be met with a great deal of scrutiny. The biggest complaint that I've seen is over the change of Bumblebee, who was portrayed in the original cartoon as a VW Bug, into the forthcoming 2008 Chevy Camaro. (Which is something that just pisses me off anyway, not because he should be a bug, but because, while I wasn't thrilled with Chevy's decision to drop the Camaro name, the fact that they are brining it back on the apex of the tidal wave of 'retro' vehicles drives me crazy as well... though it looks sexy as fuck... (Which makes me think... I don't talk about cars enough on here... I should fix that... like changing the name of the Ford Five-Hundred to Taurus, a brand they just dropped because it couldn't keep up... WAKE UP FORD! The sagging sales on the Five-Hundred has nothing to do with name recognition, and sticking the name of a recently decommissioned brand with sagging sales on it and calling it new is just silly... IT DOESN'T EVEN RESEMBLE A TAURUS!) ooops... sorry about that...)

Michael Bay (who's name is slathered all over this thing), has finally released an "authorized" trailer and photos, allowing us to see his 'true vision'. I have to say that I'm impressed. Although, my good friend Mike criticizes the creatures as looking too insect like, however, I am trying, again, to view them as something 'new'. An homage if you will.

I have a lot of hopes for this film, not only because I grew up watching the original show, but because Michael Bay has shown a lot of potential before now...

But, it is merely hopes that I have for now...

Mike suggested something the other day, while we were talking about this film... something about re-doing Voltron I think...

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

In other news of the great old cartoons, I was a huge fan of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a kid (as a matter of fact, I have a great photo of my old Guinea Pig in my Turtle Van I need to get scanned, because it's AWESOME!), and as I got older, I got into the Eastman & Laird, the original, darker and grittier, story that the late '80's 'toon was based on. Now, darker and grittier is a pretty hard to explain thing, it doesn't mean that the story was based on 'hard-ass' turtles devoid of humor who merely go around kicking ass...

The new TMNT movie is said to be based on this version, and entirely in CG.

Wow, I have such mixed opinions on this one that it's not even funny. I can tell that I'm not the only one as I cruise the webs for more info on it, but, none-the-less, that word that keeps cropping up throughout my ramblings here makes another appearance, hope.

FilmSpot.com, as well as the rest of the interwebs of trailers of both of these, so, you'd do well to check those out, because, you can only decide things for yourself.


The New 7 Wonders...

There's a 'global vote' going on right now in regards to compiling a new list of the 7 Wonders of the World. This site has all the info. The concept is simple... a list that's over 2000 years old, possibly compiled by the Greek Philo of Byzantium (for more information, check out this wiki article). It's said that Philo is not the actual creator of the list, but, either way, only one of the sites listed as the original 7 wonders of the world still stands in near it's original state, the Pyramids of Egypt.

The fact is, this is actually a huge undertaking, and it seems to be progressing globally. The idea of a global vote for a new list is excellent.... the fact that some of the 'nominees' are Christ the Redeemer, the Sydney Opera House, and the Statue of Liberty are pretty disheartening. Which is why it's actually sad... there really aren't a lot of options for 'modern wonders'.... at least not in my opinion.

However, the vote is happening, and you are welcome as a citizen of this great planet to log-in and vote for your choices.


If you're not a nerd, scroll to the next bolded headline...

This guy won the RSA's 'hacker competion, and provides a great 'play by play' on his blog. Check it out, because it's actually somewhat interesting.

Note, the competition was held at the 2007 RSA Conference and was actually called the 'Interactive Testing Challenge'.


Links from Mike...

Things that Mike sent me.... things he like so much he sent them twice in as many days...

First, Lucas Arts has released another new video for Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, which shows the new physics system they have called DMM (Digital Molecular Matter). It's pretty amazing stuff, and you can check it out here at IGN.com. (Although, they have officially announced that thy will have no multi-axii control support ala WII / PS3 for Light Saber battles...)

And, this is how computers actually work. Check it out... the Japanese are great! I always suspected that my cursor was being moved by pixel sized Japanese men, but, it's nice to have that confirmation.

This dog is amazing!






and I think that's all... for now.