WEBSITE. thinkwonder

back in college a friend of mine, mic, created this website called 'thinkwonder.com' and it was awesome. it had this whole non sequitur radiohead vibe to it. one of the best parts about it was the discussion board. it was always lively and the posts were always interesting.
recently another friend of mine, reuben, has resurrected the discussion board. it has been cool talking with those guys again and doing the discussion board again. i commend reuben on hosting the site and getting it started again, but heres the big problem: no one seems to have anything to say! discussion boards are only cool if people are actually having discussions! so, i am writting this post to invite you to sign up at the discussion board so that we can have more people involved who might actually post something... the link is here.

TV. attack of the show

dear attack of the show,

i really love your show and i watch it when ever i can. i enjoy the different segments that you have, and i really love the hosts kevin, brendan, sarah, and will. they are very entertaining to watch and fun to listen to.
the best part of your show each week is the tuesday episodes with the 'dvduesday' segment with chris gore. may i humbly make a suggestion? please expand this segment. actually, i think you should pull it out into a complete half hour show hosted by chris gore and shown every tuesday.
hey, it would be better than that 'cinematech' crap you put on now...

thank you.

ps- are you ever going to announce who won the cohost job? i assume it was will, but he wasnt really one of the choices...

BOOKS. max lucado

you know what ticks me off? whores. i dont mean the prostitute kind (although i not a fan of them either...), i mean people who take advantage of their success by producing crap just so they can get more money.
the biggest culprit i can think of is max lucado. many people will be mad at me for saying this about him, but he is truly a book whore. if you dont know who he is then you obviously havent been anywhere near a christian bookstore. ever. let me tell you about him: he writes spirituality books that are at about a 4th grade reading level. the spirituality in them is very very shallow. he rarely tries to dig deep below the surface, he would rather just explain everything with 'warm fuzzies'. his style is all story based, no matter what he is talking about he always seems to have a story about someone who is down on their luck or just lost their child, and that person is miraculously made better and all their problems are solved because they said 'jesus'. seriously, thats about as deep as he gets. i have read a few of his books and i have found very little substance, rather, its filled with manipulative emotional garbage.
im sure the guy is nice and all, but you can tell he is writing for an audience of 60 year old women who collect 'precious moments' figurines.
but the thing that bugs me the most about him is the way he takes advantage of the 'christian scene'. (its actually sick that there has to bee a 'scene' at all. christ tells us to make an impact in this world and make disciples of all nations, but how are we going to do that if we live in our own 'christian' bubble and never participate in the real wold? sorry, a bit of a rant, let me get back on topic...) the crowd he is writing for are people who think buying a christian book and supporting the christian industry will somehow turn others to jesus. lucado takes advantage of this by flooding the market with product so people will think its their christian duty to buy it all.
have you seen the sheer amount of books this guy has published? i would dare say that he has a book, journal, study guide, or reissue released every single month of the year. and that goes double around christmas. every time he writes a book they release the book, a response journal, a study guide, a version for kids, a version for men, a version for women, a version for college kids, etc.
im not sure why i bring this up, i guess i was just walking through a christian book store this week and was really disgusted.

TV. an unexpected heart

tuesday i found myself moved by the most unexpected thing. i was catching up on my tivo watching and i spotted a new episode from monday of the late late show. i always love that show, craig ferguson makes me laugh hard.
i start it up expecting some of his trademark scottish humor, but things are a bit different tonight (i could tell right away- he was wearing a tie!) it turns out that over the weekend craigs father passed away. i guess it was reruns last week because craig said that he got to spend the week with his family and father in the hospital.
he spent the monologue talking about his fathers life and some of the things he remembered about him. it was really moving, actually. the rest of the show was devoted to his father. dr. drew was on to talk about grief and how we can heal and learn from it. then a traditional scottish band, called "wicked tinkers" played a song for his father. it was a bagpipe and a couple drums. the last guest was amy something-or-other... i dont remeber her last name, but she was the wife of john ritter before he died.
it struck me as really moving and cool that someone would want to go through the grieving process in such a public way. im sure many people found it helpful in understanding their own grief.
yet another reason why i love that show...

TV. lost (actually, not the one you are thinking...)

i have a tivo and periodically it will record shows as suggestions that it thinks i might like based on my recording history. usually i erase the suggestions right away because its for stupid shows, but every once in a while it will record something i didnt know about, but that i actually would like to watch. one example of this is a show on G4 called brainiac- its really great, but i had no idea about it until tivo introduced me.
yesterday, during the lazy sunday afternoon, i was checking out the suggestions and i saw the entry 'lost'. i thought this strange because it wasnt the abc show. actually, it was an old reality show that was on nbc back in 2001. the premise is that six people, three teams of two, are dropped in the middle of nowhere, blindfolded, and told they will win 100,000 dollars if they are the first team to make it to the statue of liberty. they are given basic suplies, and about 300 bucks, then sent off on their way to fend for themselves.
a really interesting premise and the show itself was actually really good! they had a marathon of the first season on sunday, so i got to see the whole trip in one afternoon and was really drawn in by the journey and people. they ended up being put in the middle of bolivia and struggled at every turn to afford transportation and food. as far as reality tv goes, it was really solid because they didnt try and streach the story out, it was only three episodes.
anyway, i was impressed.

GAMES. ssx on tour

i dont usually like sports games, but i do kind of dig 'extreme' sports games. my old roommate in utah turned me on to tony hawk and we had a great old time playing that for hours and hours. after i moved i was informed by him that i must buy a game called 'ssx tricky'. i wasnt quite sure what to expect. but i came across it new for only 8.99, so i figured i couldnt go wrong. what a surpise! that game rocked! then 'ssx3' came out and it was even better than 'tricky'!!! when i got it i would play an hour or two every night- i was obsessed! it is still one of my favorite games of all time. if i were stuck on a desert island and only had one video game i would take 'ssx3' because i could still sit and play that one for 3 or 4 hours at a time.
over christmas my parents got me the latest version- 'ssx on tour'. i havent had much of a chance to play it until last night. it is quite different than the last two, but that addictive fun of the series is still in full swing! some of the additions are fun like hand railing and other contests, but i miss a few of the aspects from 'ssx3' like being able to go down the hill in one fast run. an amusing little addition is the ability to play as mario or luigi- they even have the voices and coin noises. quite cool.
i think i will reserve my judgement on it until i have played a few more hours. i am hoping the new style and structure will grow on me as it has in the series before.

BOOKS. pop up books

last night i went to borders bookstore with a friend of mine. i had read a review about this new crazy pop up book that was super detailed. i remembered it while we were there, so we went on a quest throughout the store looking for pop up books. (we had to search because, oddly enough, they arent the most popular type of book) when we finally found them we pulled them out and were amazed! these things were mind-bogglingly intricate and totally incredible. the best ones were by a guy named robert sabuda. he had alot of them. each page of his books had a huge pop up picture and also a few extra little ones on the sides to help tell the story. his best were the retellings of 'the wizard of oz,' and 'alice in wonderland'. if you get the chance, check them out, they are totally cool.

GAMES. the revolution continues

i happened across another interesting article about the nintendo revolution. this is a first hand account of someone who has actually played with the controller. the more i read, the more excited i get... read it here.

GAMES. the revolution

as a nintendo fanboy i have been keeping my eye on the news of nintendos next generation console, which is called the 'revolution.' if you havent heard about the crazy new controller or anything else about it, then you need to go here. on this site i read a very interesting editorial about the alternate path nintendo is deciding to take. if you have any interest in video gaming, this is a very informative article about the future of the industry. to read the editorial, go here.

TV. '05: reruns

as i look back at the year that was i find that my television watching habits have changed quite alot. partly, this may be due to the fact that this year i got a tivo... there are alot of shows i love that i never used to, and there are some shows that i am totally burned out on that i used to be really into. the great thing about tivo is that if you like a show in syndication you can have it record the show whenever its on any channel. i did this alot this year. here are some older shows i got into (or out of) this year:

friends- at the beginning of the year i was really into this show. it is on almost eight times a day around here! after a little while though, the show kind of loses something, i dont know what it is, but i slowly lost interest and now i dont watch it at all.

yes, dear- i know its not the greatest show ever, but there is a sort of charm to it. for a while i would watch most of the episodes recorded, but my interest has wained. ill still watch an episode here or there occasionally.

just shoot me- my interest in this show lasted about a day.

dharma and greg- i saw an episode and kind of liked it. then i got over it- quickly.

cosby show- they started showing reruns on tv land. i totally loved this show growing up, its nice to revisit some of the old episodes now and then.

becker- i never discovered this show until they started reruning it on wgn. it is so good! i discovered it over the summer, which is when i dotn have a job. so i ended up watching every single episode i could find. fortunately for me, they were rerunning it on three different channels around here! so i would actually watch three episodes of this show a day! the show wasnt on for that many years, so i think i have actually seen every episode. i havent grown sick of it, i have just seen everything. too bad.

TV. shows that are stupid

i feel the need to make a list of shows that are stupid. i know, these are only my opinions, but im right. so, here goes:

csi- i dont like crime dramas, and i especially dont like procedural dramas.

csi miami or new york- see above.

law and order- see above.

law and order svu- see above.

law and order whatever else- see above.

shield- see above.

boston legal- see above. (but i will give it props for keeping shatner on the air)

e ring- see above.

close to home- see above.

numbers- ok, i give. this is actually the only cop-ish drama i enjoy. and mostly thats because i really loved the movie 'pi' and it totally reminds me of some of the cool stuff in there.

TV. the colbert report

ive been a fan of the daily show for quite a while now. jon stewart had cracked me up since before he had a late night show on fox. i remember when the daily show was hosted by craig kilborn and it wasnt really that fun. but jon stepped in and over the years has become great. i watch it everyday and really enjoy his humor and observations even though i have very different political views than him.
i remember a particular sketch they had from time to time called stephen vs steven where stephen colbert would argue with steven correl. each time they would devolve into childish name calling and yelling. it was so funny.
as much as i like the daily show, i think i actually like the colbert report better! the humor is amped up to 11. colbert totally makes fun of his opinions and makes himself into a parody of all the stupid talking heads on the other news shows. its really great stuff. i love his "the word" each day. one of the funniest things is when he goes over to the table to talk with his guest, he does like a victory cheer with fists pumped in the air. sort of a 'im awesome and the guest is no where near as cool as me!' dance. priceless. another great part is the "get to know your representative" feature where he highlights one representative a week (there are 435 in all). i think the best episode so far was the one with jeff daniels. stephen kept asking him questions about his hometown, even asking him which local paper he read, and what he felt of the local resolution to raise funds for a local group. it was really funny.
the daily show and the colbert report are two really great shows, and a perfect hour of televison for those who want to pretend to be current with the days events.

BOOKS. state of fear

i just picked up this new one from michael crichton. ive always loved his stuff. i first got into his writing through jurassic park. actually, i was ahead of the game and read the book a few months before the movie first came out. i really loved the book (the movie too, even though they were so different.) i got hooked on his style of writing- he has an amazing way of writing a page-turning adventure, and including tons of interesting research and science. it never feels tacked on, he is able to blend the story and science perfectly. after jurassic park i checked out some of his other books. i really loved most of them (disclosure really sucked) and still look to his book sphere as one of my favorite books ive ever read. granted, his older books are a lot better than is more recent efforts, but almost anything he writes is fun to read.
i picked up the new one earlier this week (i wait till paperback, as most smart people do- its like 20 bucks cheaper) and was checking out the list of books he has written, an di realized ive actually read all of this other fiction books! shoot! anyway, i look forward to starting this new one. i dont really know anything about it, and i think i prefer that. a new adventure begins...

WORDS. tetris head

tetris head (tet' ris hed): noun, a medical condition brought on by playing a puzzle game for too long. manifested in altered thinking. after you turn off the game, your mind still sees everything through the rules of the puzzle. eg: after playing tetris too long you start to look around and see how you could better stack cars on the road so as to get a four line tetris. for the most part harmess, unless affected late in the evening because it will destroy any chance of a normal restful dream.

GAMES. bomberman

ive come to a bit of a conclusion. ive decided that old video games are the best. now, i know this reaks of nastalgia, but i think its true. as stated before, im a nintendo fan boy, so that should give you an indication of the kind of games i like. im not a fan of the first person shooters, in not a fan of role playing games, war games, or most sports games. i like it fairly simple. to me a video game is alot of fun... for a half hour. i usually get sick of it after much more than that. i prefer games that i can pick up, play for a little while, then go about the rest of my day. based on this, you can probably understand why i prefer nintendo.
anyway, ive recently bought a new game which cemented this conclusion of mine. i recently bought super bomberman for the nintendo ds. its a really old game, nice and simple. its been updated in the graphics department and modified so as to take advantage of the touch screen, but other than that, its about a fifteen year old game. and i cant get enough of it! i actually have to set limits on myself. i cant play it within two hours of bedtime, or else i get tetris head and my sleep is ruined!
ill put this new conclusion to the test in a couple weeks when the ds mario kart game comes out.