The Man Who Wasn't There

Weekend was good. Didn't do much, outside of the fight, but it was good. I did take a video of another fight, that of my brother's best friend Tony. Tony is a beast. He's 220-230ish (can't remember), and his fight lasted about 10 seconds. Got to meet him, finally, yesterday and it's amazing. He basically amounts to a teddy bear outside of the ring. But, damn, I would not want to face him in the ring.

My brother told me yesterday that the guy he beat actually passed out. I didn't realize this until today, but I caught a moment on film where you can see the results. As the film fades out to the aftermath portion, you can see the ref reach down, pick up the guy's arm, it flops down. He was unconscious at that point.

This is an awesome article, written concerning the recent hooopla over Mass Effect on Fox News. I was really, really glad to see it. But, it also exemplifies the problem with "journalism" today. And I use the term journalism very, very loosely. It's not about hashing things out and getting to the bottom of controversies. It's not about pursuing truth. It's not about telling the truth. It's about tabloids. It's about speaking before knowing. It's about lies.

I remember reading an article a few years ago about the "new journalism." The article, written, ironically enough, by a journalist working for the companies that it affects and is about, described how 9/11 changed the face of journalism. I'm going to completely butcher what was said, but the basic gist was that during 9/11 it was the tabloids who were getting the most news. For years, they were the place to go for "news" concerning celebs and when 9/11 happened, a lot of people apparently turned to them in droves because they had the information faster than the news programs.

When 9/11 was over and things were calming down, news programs began realizing just how much tabloids were making off of gossip, celebs and controversies. So, what happened to the news? They started taking on aspects of tabloids. We all know tabloids tell before knowing and make up the most egregious things before knowing if they're true or not, becuase it's about the dollar and about who can sell the news the quickest. No one who reads those magazines seem to care if it's real or not; if it is, they read it first. If it's not, well, there's always next time.

So, this piece of Fox News is interesting because it proves this point so damn well:

“'I recognize that I misspoke,' she said. 'I really regret saying that, and now that I’ve seen the game and seen the sex scenes it’s kind of a joke.

'Before the show I had asked somebody about what they had heard, and they had said it’s like pornography,' she added. 'But it’s not like pornography. I’ve seen episodes of Lost that are more sexually explicit.'"

Basically, we're listening to this woman; a woman who not only hasn't played the game but had absolutely no frickin' knowledge of the game past what someone "heard"? Utterly ridiculous.

I don't understand, sometimes, how youtube works. I uploaded a video (which took forever) and then it had to process (which took forever, as well). Now, the video is finally up. Unfortunately, when I do a search with words from the title, it doesn't come up...I guess it takes awhile, which seems to be a familiar refrain with youtube.

Anyway, my brother had his third fight last night. I filmed the entire thing...well most of it. In my excitement, I stopped filming at the very end and then remembered to start filming again (hence the little transition). Edited the whole thing together and it's up at youtube.

This was probably his most exciting fight I've watched. I was a bit worried because when I spoke to my brother prior to the match, he mentioned the fact that he was fighting a guy named Pat Harvey...who's 32 year old...who owns his own dojo...who is very experienced...who has fought 12 matches so far. Then, when Pat was walking up to the cage, I see this hulkin' huge guy in front and I'm thinking he's the guy Chris is fighting...then I realized he was part of Harvey's Harvey's posse. You can see the hulkin' guy I'm talking about at the very end as he leaves the match. He's the big guy wearing the black shirt.

Here it is:

Oh man, it is flippin' cold. I know it's flippin' cold because of two things. The first is that I noticed that I had frost/ice on the inside of my car. The second is that my car told me it was -7. In places around the metro it was -11. So, in retrospect I should say it was warm where I was at because it could have been colder.

Since I'm an idiot, I'm driving to work with my hands in my sweater's sleeves because I have yet to purchase gloves. Why? Because I'm an idiot.

I actually wish that, of all the times I could be going to training in Biloxi that I were there right now. I see that it's 48 degrees right now. Which some of you might scoff at as being called warm, but is like roasting in the fires of hell right now, compared to where I'm at.

DMC4 demo and PixelJunk Monsters are out today and for that I cry, "Huzzah!" The Moment of Truth is crap television. And not the kind of crap television that is actually fun to watch in a sort of why-the-hell-am-I-subjecting-myself-to-this. It's the crap television that's...well, crap. It's boring as hell, for one. And I don't understand how someone could lose the game outside of not answering a question. The first guy they had on lied and I'm thinking, why would you do that? You're at $100,000 and you lied? Way to go slick. Horribly boring and stupid show. In my defense, it was only background noise as we were destroying skeletons and wights in DDO...

My brother is supposedly fighting this weekend. He's one of the two headliners on the flyer. So they have him all looking tough and stuff on the flyer, with his fists up. It's kind of silly. But he's really excited and I'm...well, about the same as last time. Which is to say not very excited because that's my brother those fists are flying at.

I say he's supposedly fighting and that's because the guy he's supposed to fight never got back with them to schedule the fight. So, I asked him who he's fighting and it sounded like they'll have to grab someone at the fight. Which makes me wonder how many people just show up there, hoping to get in the ring. I have to say I'm a little relieved he's not fighting the guy he was supposed to. That guy is more experienced; he's had seven fights, four of which he's won and, according to my brother, none of his opponents were easy.

In other good news, I feel like I'm making strides towards feeling better. I'm still hacking up a lung, but it's more like half a lung than a full one right now. So...relatively speaking, that's a good thing.

...right?

How was everyone's holiday? Has anyone seen Sweeney Todd or AvP:R yet? I'm curious how they are. Not much to report on right now. I already talked about my brother's match. I got a super cool gift card from Nikki for Gamestop and picked up a couple Nintendo DS games. I hardly ever play handheld game systems even though there are games out there that I'm interested in.

So, I picked up Hotel Dusk: Room 215 and the latest Phoenix Wright game. I've never played a Phoenix Wright/Ace Attorney game before. However, I really want to play the Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law game that's coming out in January and I'll probably review it; consequently, I'd like to have something to compare it to so that I can see if it lives up to the gameplay of the Ace Attorney games. I'm enjoying it so far.

It's interesting. Kind of wordy and the humor is all over the place...literally. I think I'm done with hearing about how one of the character's hemorrhoids constantly flare up. Seriously.

Hotel Dusk, though, is excellent. It's truly like an interactive novel (you even hold it on its side!). Also very wordy. But it's a puzzle/mystery game and it definitely feeds my inner noir-lover. Love the art, too. I'm really enjoying it.

( blahing about itunes and iphone )

So, I'm glad I have a PS3 for my Blu Ray watching. Today, the PS3 gets a firmware update that brings the Blu Ray profile to 1.1. This doesn't mean much yet, but next year the first 1.1 Blu Ray titles are coming out and include Sunshine, Resident Evil: Extinction, 3:10 to Yuma and the abysmal War. Profile 1.1 includes a lot of the features that HD DVD herald as a plus and is also a reason some titles (like the Matrix, I believe) have yet to migrate. Some publishers were waiting until 1.1 to release their titles.

Now, the reason I'm glad I have a PS3 for the Blu Ray watching is that while it is a firmware upgrade, unfortunately older standalone devices lack decoding chips in their hardware needed for PiP or the internet ports needed for BD-Live. The PS3 has the ability for the profile; a Blu Ray player purchased a year ago, does not. It's annoying and if I were an early adopter of the standalone players, I'd be pissed.

Packages are flying in and Shaido is going crazy. She loves boxes. And there's more on the horizon. I should be getting three more packages today! Arugh! I'm drowning in boxes!

I guess this UFC qualifying match this Saturday is "A Big Deal." I didn't realize it fell into the "Big Deal" with quotations category until I was told so by my brother. It's quite the event, with tickets starting at $15 for general admission and going up into the "VIP" range, as well. There's apparently going to be approximately 12 matches, leading up to the "headline" fight. My brother is in the final three fights, according to him, which is pretty cool...I guess.

I got him The Orange Box for his birthday present because I want him to actually play something that doesn't start with an "H" and end with an "alo" and he's never played Half Life 2. Hopefully he'll like it. Christmas is going crazy. I'm spending more than I expected and more than I should. But I love giving gifts. I agonize over present choices sometimes and it drives me bonkers.