Mondo Mayhem now has a new home

This will be my last post on Mondo Mayhem. I know this particular blog was short-lived, but I've got a new home thanks to a deal I cut with Izzy, so now I'm on Typepad. My new home is Prognosis Negative. It's at jatser.typepad.com. I already move all the posts from this blog to that one, and I'm currently in the process of building and designing the site, which should be in a final form by the end of the week. So, same stuff basically, just new address. I always wanted to name my blog PN, I just couldn't under blogger, so that's why there's a name change. So see ya' there.

PS: I will keep this site up as long as blogger allows it. Later.

Jatser

The First Snow

The first snow of the season hit us here in Northeast Ohio today, a bit late compared to other years. I find as I grow older, I dread the snow more and more for the driving conditions that follow. But still, I love to have a white Christmas.

Laura, being a teacher, loves the snow as much as her students, for that entails time off. If only hospitals had snow days...

Of course, lots of people would die from the sudden staff shortages, and mass chaos would ensue, but I'd get to sleep in.

Batman is a Homosexual

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Mondo Review - Blade Trinity

Saw Blade: Trinity last night with Izzy since Laura was all tuckered out after dealing with hell-spawn teenagers all day. I really enjoyed the first Blade, which was the first of a great line of subsequent Marvel-based movies. Blade II, while a good movie in its own right, went with a darker, more gothic look that I didn't really enjoy, and I thought the premise was a little silly (reapers eating vampires like vamps eat people).

I went into Blade: Trinity with low expectations, wanting merely a movie that would have some good action, some humor, and a decent plotline. While I thought the movie was okay, I think it just barely delivered on the above.

Basically, without getting into spoilers, Blade joins a group of new vampire hunters called "night-stalkers" to defeat a new enemy while on the run from the law.

This time out, the man who wrote the first two Blade movies comes to the director's chair for the first time, and he does a decent job. Nothing extraordinary, it's basically your typical Bruckheimer film. The style is a bit of the first and second movie melded together, at times very clean, other times gritty and shaky. I hated the times when the camera jumps around real fast to quick jump shots of one character then the other (I call it the Bay effect), as it sometimes made things a little confusing. It's a trend in action movies lately and I guess I just have to get used to it.

I won't give any spoilers for the story, but overall I was underwhelmed. The main villain is laughable. He's set up as this major badass in the beginning, then half-way through the film ends up running from Blade, just to sword-fight him in the end. Very lame. The other bad guys are pretty weak here too, with no good explanations as to why this group of vamps is important (are they the leading clan, or just the one' s to discover the new bad guy, or what?). The ending is also a let-down, with no satisfying resolutions, just a lingering "to be continued" vibe that hangs in the air while the many plotholes opened up throughout the movie are never resolved.

The acting was decent on the hero side. Wesley Snipes has Blade down by now, which is to say he can pose with a sword well and grunt out things while looking cool. Ryan Reynolds (AKA Van Wilder) provides some comic relief as Blade's wise-cracking foil, but just manages to be a little more irritating than funny. Jessica Biel does her job, looking hot while performing maneuvers and knocking out 200+ lbs bad guys with her 90 lbs frame.

One funny thing we both noticed is that Goyer has a hard-on for the iPod. It's featured in several close-ups, there's dialogue and shots of Jessica making her playlists, and she dons her ear-buds before every battle because it's said "she likes to fight to her own background music". Now, I love my iPod, but even I thought this was gratuitous and just came out plain silly.

Overall, I give Blade: Trinity a C+.

Best Buy Line Lady, What Gives?

At Best Buy today, picking up some good deals on X-Box games for my brother. Now, what is it about Best Buy that makes the store so busy no matter when you go? I've been to this place several times at all hours of the day, and it's always full (like Wal-Mart). Do people work anymore?


Anyway, I'm in line, it's pretty damn long. Looking at all the impulse buy products they put there to get you to buy them on a whim. There's Robosapiens ( a lady actually gets one on impulse, they go for a hundred dollars each!), batteries, small doo-dads, yadda yadda yadda.


Then I get to the end of the line to where the registers kick in. However, I notice there's a lady there, a Best Buy employee. She says hi, asks me how I'm doing, then points me to register 6 and tells me to go there.


Here's the thing. Register 6 is one of the most busy. There are 5 other registers less busy. So, do I do as the lady says, or pick my own line? What would the consequences be? Would she yell? Call security? Cold-cock me?


I never found out. Like the non-confrontational dork I am, I followed her advice. Of course I got behind a lady buying $300 in DVDs, she actually wants to know about the magazine deal, and the register lady loses her conterfeit-finding magic marker, while boatloads of people fly through in the lines parallel to me.


I am a cursed man.

An Open Letter to Puzz 3d

Dear Purveyors of Tri-Dimensional Puzzle Goodness,

Hello Puzz 3D. I am Jatser, a mid-twenties geek from Ohio (sorry about the election). Anyways, my fiancee Laura and I were watching an episode of "Everybody Loves Raymond", where Ray and his mother-in-law were bonding over a puzzle. Laura and I like to "bond", so we went out to get some of that puzzle goodness. Suffice to say, we ended up getting a Puzz 3D because, well, an extra dimension of puzzling must equal even more fun. We went with the model "Minas Tirith" from Lord of the Rings, because I am a huge dork.


Laura was sleeping, so I decided to dive in and see what this thing was all about (for all those dirty thinkers, I'm talking about the puzzle). So I open it up, and the first thing I notice is that it's all foam. Okay, I think, I see why, it needs to be cheap and be able to fit well together in 3 dimensions, so that's cool. Static electricity might be a problem, but whatever.

Then I read the directions. It turns out I have to remove all the "bad" pieces with red dots on them, that these are not real puzzle pieces but left-overs of the puzzle-making process. Not only that, but most of the good pieces have holes in them to fit in three dimensions, but most of these need punched out by yours truly. Thanks a lot Puzz 3D. Not only did I spend an hour and a half separating the good pieces from the bad like some evil puzzle segregationist, but I had to spend another hour punching holes out of the good pieces so they would fit. Thanks for taking the fun out of the whole puzzle process.

We paid $29.99 for a puzzle that wasn't even ready for putting together yet. I felt like I was the last worker on the assembly line. If you guys ever have any competition in the 3D puzzle market, be sure that I will choose your competitors over you any day of the week.

Your Disgruntled Puzzle Geek,
Jatser

In Honor

In honor of all those men and women who gave their lives serving this nation 63 years ago at Pearl Harbor, and those who continue to serve their country, we all thank you.

And to Michael Bay, who directed the cinematic abortion that was Pearl Harbor, may you never touch a movie of import again.

Trey Parker - "End of an Act":

I miss you more than Michael Bay missed the mark,
When he made Pearl Harbor.
I miss you more then that movie missed the point,
And that’s an awful lot girl.
And now, now you've gone away,
And all I'm trying to say,
Is Pearl Harbor sucked and I miss you.

I need you like Ben Affleck needs acting school,
He was terrible in that film.
I need you like Cuba Gooding needed a bigger part,
He's way better then Ben Affleck.
And now all I can think about is your smile,
And that shitty movie too,
Pearl Harbor sucked and I miss you.

(Interlude)

Why does Michael Bay get to keep on making movies.
I guess Pearl Harbor sucked,
Just a little bit more then I miss you.