Wacky Wacky Icons

So boredom has struck. Because I figured out (since I'm, you know, dumb) how to switch around my avatars for every posting or comment on LiveJournal (still can't do it here, durp), I figured it was about time to whip some up. Helps that I've figured out how to comfortably put text on these things, too. Crappily, but they're there.

So here, for your edification, is what I have. Since it's a free account I can only carry 6, and I'm still trying to think of a good picture for the *big dopey grins* kinda posts, but here's what I got:

From Sheldon:

From Akira:

MegaMan via VG Cats:

Advent Children:

From nowhere in particular, for those days when there's nothing important to say:

Arbor

- Happy Day.

Have a tree.

And a giraffe.

- Sometimes I'm ashamed to be a Transformers fan.

They're making a live-action movie, something that everyone who's ever been a fan should be overjoyed for.

Instead?

Fandom is now saying that it's going to be the biggest bomb of 2007.

Why, is this?

Because they're making a police car Decepticon. And because they're naming a tank Devastator, a character who was a Gestalt (Combiner robot) in the series.

No, I'm serious. Transfans actually believe that the movie will the worst film of the year, will be critically lambasted and that no one will come see it, simply because of these two events.

Ugh.

People.

THEY'RE MAKING A TRANSFORMERS MOVIE.

Take a moment. Let that absorb into your head.

Let me repeat:

TRANSFORMERS. MOVIE.

Live action. Cars, trucks, fighter jets, tanks.

Transforming into giant robots and fighting each other.

We've been wanting this for 20 years, and you're going to say you don't want to see it because of that?

For shame.

- Finally...

Wii!!!

What... Wha... Huh?

Adult Swim gives the Family Guy treatment to another old show, resurrecting it from cancellation grave with brand-new episodes.

The show?

Saved By The Bell.

No. I'm serious.

There are so many reasons I want to go beat my head against a wall right now.

I'm fairly sure this is going to be the first non-animated series on Cartoon Network.

Non-animated. On Cartoon Network.

That means NOT a cartoon on a cartoon channel.

You know, like how MTV doesn't play videos. And we all know how much I love that channel because of it.

Quite simply, just the fact that this news exists is enough to make me lose a lot of respect for Adult Swim. They might redeem themselves if they put a bit of the ol' Adult Swim edge into the show.

But I'm not betting money on it.

Advent Loserz

Before I start going off on this movie, two things to say:

- First, I had written a bunch of stuff to post. Then my computer went putz. Me much pissy.

- Loserz. It's a webcomic. Reminds me of Questionable Content, but nerdier, with inferior drawing and the occasional naked girl. Fun stuff.

Now, on to one of the best movies I've seen in years. The movie that Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within should have been.

Spoilerific!




















Seriously
















Okay?













Okay.

If you've played any Final Fantasy games, then viewed Spirits, you had to have been walking out of there disappointed. It had the name Final Fantasy, it had a character named Cid (every FF has a Cid), and that was about the extent of the connection between the movie and the series.

Well, Advent Children is going to blow your pants off.

Spirits Within had sci-fi action. Advent Children has sci-fi action, swordfights, martial arts, sorcery, gunplay, monsters, motorcycle fights along the streets of Midgar. Everything that Final Fantasy is known for.

What impressed me most, beyond the fact that this film even exists, is how well they integrated a lot of gameplay aspects into movie. Materia is used to harness magical power. Bahamut is Summoned from the skies above. Cloud, Tifa, and Red XIII all take advantage of Limit Breaks, with Cloud smacking Sephiroth around with Blade Beams and Omnislash, Red using a Sled Fang, and Tifa pulling out some damn sweet combos like Meteodrive and Somersault.

Even beyond those aspects, the action scenes in this movie are breathtaking. The movie itself is motion capture CGI, like Polar Express only not nearly so creepy. Because of this, the movements and camera angles are smooth, fast, and just pretty.

Everyone returns, finally seen in all their lifelike glory. Cloud, Tifa, Barrett, Red, Cid, Yuffie, Vincent, and Cait Sith all return (minus Cait's mog, although we do see a nice moogle cameo in the form of a girl's stuffed toy). Aeris/th and Zack are both seen in dream sequences. Marlene becomes a major player, as do Rude & Reno, members of Shinra's goon squad. The two latter characters even become relative protagonists within the film, fighting the Children and assisting Cloud and his crew. Since it's a Japanese film, most of the characters come off as Asian decent, which can be a little jarring to anyone who can only picture their manga counterparts. But it feels more comfortable than FFX's Japanese Tidus and Yuna.

The voice talent doesn't bug me as much as I thought it would, mostly because the majority of the actors have done it before. Mena Suvari does reprise her role as Aeris/th, which still disappoints me, but overall it's good work. Rachael Leigh Cook (sp?) plays Tifa quite well, actually.

Some minor quibbles for the voices revolve around the choices for some of the side characters: Cid's got a Texas cowboy accent, which is fine. Red has a very, um, British/Tony Head kinda voice, which is fine. But they gave Cait a "hey, I'm Shrek!" Scottish voice. Which is okay, considering he barely talks. I just am gonna be irritated when Dirge of Cerberus comes around.

My main complaint? Not enough movie. It was an hour and a half, but I left wanting to see more. Here's hoping they continue this type of treatment, whether it be another FFVII, or if they expand to 8, 9, 10. Hell, give me 6. Hell, give me Chrono Trigger! Keep em comin!

Kingdom Hearts 2.1

Kingdom Hearts: Inverted Hearts is a fan-brew "sequel" to the original Kingdom Hearts. I haven't played the demo yet, but the pictures and ideas are pretty cool.

Especially the whole "Hey, let's put Chrono Trigger in the game!" thing.

As you can tell from my rant last night, I went out expecting to get a new fridge and a new DVD.

I returned with neither, both of them sold out by the time I got there.

Frustration ensues.

Another Note To Best Buy

I seem to be full of them.

Dear Best Buy (And you might wanna listen, too, Circuit City),

When you advertise a DVD in your weekly circular, a DVD that you're advertising for 15 dollars, when everyone else has it for 20, do you think that it might be possible to stock more than 3 copies in the entire bloody store?!?!?!

HUH???

See, this is how you piss off customers: by not thinking about them! Let's connect:

You advertise a product.

You advertise that it is a very low cost.

You advertise it at this very low cost so that people will come to your store.

You advertise that it is a very low cost so that people will come to your store and find the product.

You advertise that it is a very low cost so that people will come to your store and find the product and pay for it.

You advertise that it is a very low cost so that people will come to your store and find the product and pay for it and pay for other things as well.

This is called "marketing." If, on the other hand, you only stock three of these products, that means that only three people will come to your store, find the product, pay for it, and pay for other things as well.

All the others? They will come to your store, not find the product, not pay for it, and not pay for other things.

And they will have a worse opinion of you in the process.

Get the connections?

Gas is currently $2.85 a gallon. I'm spending this money to come buy your product.

Don't make me get my whacking stick.

Morons.

Advent Refrigeration

Two things I'm buying tonight.

Motherfuckin' Dark Tower

Anyone wanna read my new pairing story?

Divine Goddamn Intervention, the pairing of Roland Deschain and Vincent Vega.

It's crap, but enjoy.

4 A Day

Trying to figure out a decent new signature for my Transformers threads.

Unfortunately 1) I don't know if I can fit this one down to the wanted size comfortably, and 2) not sure if I can use this one from a "copywriting" standpoint.

But, hell, it's just funny. It's from a contest from Sam & Fuzzy:

Um Wha?

- Pearl Jam and Tom Petty are touring together.

This makes no sense to me.

- The Transformers movie is now rumored to have Scorponok amongst its ranks.

This makes a surprising amount of sense to me, the more that I think about it.

The Autobots would try their darndest to keep themselves hidden amongst Earthlings (Robots In Disguise, and all). The Decepticons, on the other hand, wouldn't give a rat's pitooie about low profile, since they would consider themselves the dominant species. Their transformations, much like on Cybertron, would be meant more for function than form. Jet flies fast, Tank has big honkin gun, Truck can haul Tank and Jet.

So why would it be beyond the realm of imagination to have a Decepticon turn into a giant, robotic scorpion to terrify the populace?

Fans complained when it was said that you wouldn't see the Dinobots, yet you're going to see Scorponok. Ummm, yeah, because the Autobots wouldn't want Dinobots as, you know, dinosaurs don't exist anymore.

Decepticons would probably embrace Dinobots, Terrorcons, Predacons, anything to give them the upper hand in domination of the planet.

Oh God Dammit!

Well, two dammits.

First off, blogger's being a buttz, so I have no clue when this is being posted.

Second, the voice actors from KHII are reprising their voices for Advent Children. For the most part sure, no problem, but that means Mena Suvari is Aerith again. Goddammit!

Thankfully she's, you know, dead (spoiler spoiler spoiler!), so she probably won't have a lot of screen time.

Cuz she sucks, and all.

Narnia Newsia

They've announced their plans for the next Narnia movies.

It's going to be a trilogy.

Out of four books.

TLTWaTW.

Prince Caspian.

Voyage of the Dawn Treader AND The Silver Chair.

Huh.

Should be interesting to see how they pull this one off.

It's not like those two books can connect their plotlines without, you know, shortchanging them.

Rick Moranis = Still Alive

You know, I kept wondering what happened to him. Now I know.

According to quotes from articles in his wikipedia entry, Rick's a single parent, and took some time off from films to take care of his kids. Then, as time went by, he realized he didn't miss it.

But he WAS just up for a Grammy, he did a comedy country album lately. But he hasn't been seen onscreen since 1997.

Crazy, eh?

Second In A Row

Transformers post, that is.

Wanna know your Cybertron name? Go to this site, type in your name, and they'll give you a name and a faction. It's a fairly simple generator, using the first and last letters of your name, but it's still pretty fun. Here's what I have:

My full real name: Ironclaw (Autobot)
My real nickname: Cyberstorm (Decepticon)
My online name: Aquastar (Autobot)

Halfway Cast

Ladies and Gentlemen, according to the movie news services, we have ourselves a human cast for Transformers. I'm just gonna put down the names attached, since, quite honestly, Shia's the only one who's playing someone from the original series. As of now, these names are either cast, in final negotiations, or have offers on the table, according to IGN:

Shia LaBeouf
Jon Voight
Michael Clarke Duncan
Josh Duhamel
Bernie Mac
Rachael Taylor
Megan Fox
Tyrese Gibson
John Tuturro
John Robinson (too many IMDb's to count)
Travis Van Winkle

Still no word yet on any voices for the Transformers themselves, but there's a few people out there who believe some of these character names are just "aliases" and that the actors associated would be brought in as voices for the Transformers (Bernie Mac as Jazz, Tuturro as Starscream, etc).

I trust this list, if for no other reason than there really aren't any names on it that stand out as "fan speculation." Duncan and Voight have both worked with Michael Bay before, on Armageddon and Pearl Harbor respectively, and none of the other names are really, um, names. Mac, Tuturro, Gibson, all actors who work, but would never be called "all-stars." And, hell, with names like Rachael Taylor, John Robinson, Travis Van Winkle, how could this list even be considered fan speculation?

I'm excited to see how this turns out, and even more excited to hear who's coming in for voice work (Tom Hanks as Bumblebee? Still a chance.)

Two COMPLETELY Different Topics

- There's a convicted rapist that escaped from a treatment facility in St Peter (where one of my grandfathers lives) and has last been seen in Cass Lake (where my other grandfather grew up).

Why is it that the only time I hear of these towns anymore is when something really bad happens?

And why wasn't I able to find this article on the Star Tribune front page? Isn't the fact that this guy's extremely dangerous and has a federal warrant out on his ass somewhat, um, important?

Guess not. The War Against Mosquitoes is MUCH more relevant.

- Training Wheels, a comic I don't have linked over there yet, has a Battle Royale reference! Sweet!

Ummm... Ouch...

Smurfette on SVU.

It's what ithurtsmybrain is all about.

Ouch.

By the way, anyone ever heard of a dishwasher being hooked to a light switch?

Me, neither. Strange condo.

Title Pending

Got out of rehearsal an hour earlier last night.

Still hating it.

My refrigerator is freezing all of my food, and my dishwasher isn't plugged in.

Still no new pairing list.

Have a giraffe.

Another Rhetorical Question

What percentage of pictures on sites like Match and MySpace are of the member in a bar? 50 percent? 60?

EDIT: And the percentage of pictures of people with a drink in their hand? closer to 80%?

Love And Hate

Love Love Love:

Guitar Hero II. Hells Yeah. Multi-player is divided into lead, rhythm, and bass, 55 new songs coming your way. Also, in what could probably be considered myth amongst players, watch the video of the kid playing Cowboys From Hell on expert mode. Amazing.

Hate Hate Hate:

After coming home at 11:30 from what was most likely the least-organized tech rehearsal in the history of my theatre life (and this includes the orchestra rehearsal where the director quit, mind you), if they decided to say "alright, no more show, everyone go give your money back for your tickets," I would be happy.

Unfortunately, the set construction is so far behind, things are so disorganized, I don't see it improving much, if at all.

Wishing I hadn't let my friends guilt me into this thing, I'm regretting the decision.

Addictions

- Ooh, look at me, I'm so special, I'm making Arthur avatars like they're going out of style.

- Today is the 17th of April, the day after Easter. And we all know what that means...

PHASE 3 CANDY!! W00000T!

- Addiction #3: My friend and I made a miraculous discovery on Saturday. One that will surely be my downfall in the evenings to come.

We found a $40 used copy of Guitar Hero.

Sweet mother of mercy, it's like crack.

We played till about midnight on Saturday. She came over again Sunday night at about 8 or 8:30, and we played till about 11:30. Then she left and I played until midnight.

But, hey, I beat the medium level. Yes, since I know you're reading this, I beat Frankenstein after you left, followed by two rounds of Ziggy Stardust before bed at medium with a 95 and 97% percent accuracy. Figured Ace of Spades would be the last song I'd want to do right before bed, so Ziggy was calm enough for me.

For those reading this who don't know Guitar Hero, here's the basic summary: Think Dance Dance Revolution, but with a guitar instead of a foot pad. You have five "fret buttons" on the neck and a little switch on the body that you use to "strum" or "pluck" the guitar. They also give you a whammy bar for the long notes. Notes glide down the screen (like the arrows in DDR), and you strum the guitar while holding the right button. You get a score according to accuracy.

Difficult to describe, probably boring to watch if you don't care, incredibly fun to play.

Otherwise, my weekend was alright. Had Easter brunch with the fam. Asked questions to a few friends that I did and didn't want to know the answers to. Started counting the days until this dreaded show is over and I can get to work on Oz.

Better Late Than Never

Dante.

Randall.

Jay.

Silent Bob.

ummm... Mimi.

With glasses.

Or something.

Clerks II.

Rhetorical Fanfic Question

If Roland Deschain steps through a door into Vincent Vega's head, and steps forward to take control of Vincent, is it still a pairing, or does it become a Roland/Jules, a Roland/Mia, a Roland/Lance, a Roland/Wolf pairing? Would I have to put Roland in Jules' head to make a Roland/Vincent pairing?

Basically, if two people become one person, is it still a pairing? And does that sound really naughty?

You Know What THIS Means

This means that I'm probably gonna have to re-open Dark Tower and start working on it again. I'm in the midst of Battle Royale right now, but 1) I'm not too far in, and 2) I know the characters well enough, since I just read it recently.

If I want to write Roland, I'm going to have to write Roland well. And that means a re-read.

Final Four (and a half) Pt 1

Since trollprincess is doing it in shifts, I'm going to do it in shifts, too... so here's the final four that I'm looking at from the first 300 pairs, with some comments or plot or whatever.

In no particular order:














Roland Deschain vs. Vincent Vega. Quite a fun combination, I doubt I'll be the only one to take a shot at it. Both professional killers, both with their own code. I'm thinking it might work to have one of Roland's doors enter Vincent's head at some point during Pulp Fiction. The suitcase can be used to the story's advantage, as it's never explicitly said that it contains Marcellus Wallace's soul. Roland's opinion of Jules, who seems to take a gunslinger-style mantra after that point in the film. could also be a fun story point.














Lionel Luthor and Mr. Tumnus. Deep in the bowels of Luthorcorp lies a mysterious warddrobe that is rumored to be a doorway to another dimension. As Luthor steps through, he discovers an astonishing human-goat halfbreed who he can use to play the sides of good and evil to his own profit: the limitless moneymaking resources of the land of Narnia.

Not quite the character exploration of the Roland/Vince, this one, along with pretty much all of the others of this batch of four, would be there primarily for story purposes. Tumnus and Luthor aren't exactly an intruiging pair, but it'll be more about "what happens if x is put in y situation."










Emmett Brown & Ethan Rayne. In Sunnydale's underground, Rayne learns of the existence of a time machine in nearby Hill Valley. Ethan sets off to confront the inventor of the machine, hoping to use it for his own schemes.














Fox Mulder and Lumiere. Mulder investigates a folk legend of a vicious beast hiding in a European castle. Upon entrance into the castle, Mulder quickly learns that the monster isn't the only X-File.

And one more that I'm not putting in my top four, mostly because I don't have the guts. But I really really REALLY want to read it, even though I've heard that it already exists somewhere in the ether:














Tara Maclay and Kaylee Frye. Buffy's version of Inara and Firefly's version of Willow find some way to meet up and go at it like rabbits.

Hey, the moderator is encouraging romantic writing. And we ALL want this.

But, again, I don't have the guts.

Grrrr Ruff

Dat's me.

I just got cast as the Lion in Wizard this summer.

Should be a kick. I'm going to try my best to NOT do the movie version, as the director's trying to keep away from a direct translation.

It'll poke out there, though. The Lion's a very manic sort of personality, trying to be brave and failing miserably.

One phrase keeps popping into my head.

"Oh, God, there's blood in my mucus!"

Training Off To A New Entry

So far most of my list has not made an appearance, but if anyone wants to take a shot at these, here's what I have so far, mostly paired with characters I don't know:

25. The Little Prince (The Little Prince)/Tom Collins (Rent) ummm... no...
33. Kid Icarus/Scott Tracy (Thunderbirds)
78. Kaneda (Akira)/Jack (An American Werewolf in London) (Not from my list, but come ON, everyone knows my connection. But I don't know AWL, so someone could please...)
95. Clem (BtVS)/Penelope Clearwater (HP) (You know I can't do it when, despite much suffering on this end, I don't remember who Clearwater is!)
97. Chloe Sullivan (Smallville)/Xander (BtVS) (Tempting, but too vanilla, both characteristically and, um, erotically.)
155 Alistair McMcKeon (Honor Harrington)/Lionel Luthor (Smallville) ummm... who?
228 Lionel Luthor/Mr. Tumnus (Narnia) (Mentioned previously, under consideration. Also, I appear to not be the only one to put in Luthor and Chloe)
294. Yorick (Hamlet)/Rose Red (Fables) He's dead. Dead, I tell you!

So out of all of my pairing suggestions so far, two (maybe three, cuz the Hamlet one's actually intruiging me) are bearing fruit. Which is fine, I'm sure many others will find much pleasure in my pairings.

Note to self for next time: suggest the characters from 8-Bit Theatre, as it seems webcomics are decent fodder. Fighter and Black Mage would rule in this list.

Still waiting on:

Shogo Kawada
Kazuo Kiriyama
Mitsuko Souma
Vi
Caleb
Brainiac
Applegate
Brick Tamland
Brian Fantana
Terra
Slade
Roxas
Namine
Leon
Bigby
Pig Pen
Rerun
Maleficent

New Pairing List!

Well, first half of one, anyway. So far none of my big wants (Ginny Weasley, Kazuo Kiriyama, Mitsuko Souma, Shogo Kawada, Terra from Teen Titans) have made an appearance yet, I don't think, but here's a few that I have found. I'll narrow things down once I see part two and do the picture pairing and comments that I did last time:

32 Roland Deschain (Dark Tower)/Vincent Vega (Pulp Fiction)
63 Kaylee (Firefly)/Tara (BtVS)
48 Fred (Angel)/Simon (Firefly)
126 Luke Skywalker (Star Wars)/Eddie Dean (Dark Tower)
143 Zack (Power Rangers)/River (Firefly)
231 Emmitt Brown (Back To The Future)/Ethan Rayne (BtVS)
257 Spike (BtVS, Angel)/Earl Hickey (My Name Is Earl)

June 15th is the deadline, so I have no problem waiting till after KMK's over to start this puppy.

EDIT: Oh, and 228 Lionel Luthor (Smallville)/Mr Tumnus (Narnia) is just begging to be written

EDITER: 167 Fox Mulder (X-Files)/Lumiere (Beauty & The Beast)... oh, come on, you don't think Fox would be intruiged?

EDITEST: Seeing the pairing of David Xanatos (Gargoyles)/Stitch (Lilo and Stitch) got me thinking... why haven't the Gargoyles shown up in the Kingdom Hearts series? Isn't this the perfect outlet for them?

EDITEST THE SEQUEL: I forgot to put the link to the list. Now it's there.

Double Standard Question

Why is it that women can talk about constantly about how hot they think a guy is, and how much they want to have sex with them, but if a guy does it's considered perverted?

Nothing that I did, just something I've noticed and have been wondering...

It Happened AGAIN

Last week I mentioned that I ended up in second place in a WCCO pool.

Yesterday I found out I got second place in my office pool.

Winner gets $150.

Second place gets the printed list of the top ten, telling you that you're in second place.

I'm so proud.

Wrongness In The World

I have a friend with a dog named Leeloo.

Tim Buckley over at Ctrl Alt Del just bought a dog, and named her Kaylee.

Rule of thumb in my life: If you get a pet, never name it after a genre character that you find attractive.

It might make things complicated.

And weird.

Very weird.

Hmmm...

Remember last week, when I mentioned that I was coming to the end of a two month string of nerd expenses?

Well

I

Was

Wrong


Curses.

Anyway, here's those two avatars from my last post, featuring my first ever text insert! woo!

Tick Tock Tick Tock

I left my radio at home today. It should be ten am, but it's only nine. Joy.

In the meantime, here's some hilarious Mega Man stuff. The Breakfast Club one is good. So's the Harvey Birdman one. Forrest Gump ain't that bad, either.

Oh, in case anyone hasn't seen (which I doubt anyone has) I made up two more avatars for LiveJournal, both from one of my favorite comics ever, Sheldon. I still lack the skills, and/or the software, to make any of my icons more than image crops so far, but here ya go:

Ummm... well... okay, maybe later. Blogger's being a butt.

Staring Blankly

Today's one of those days where I wish I didn't feel obligated to post on a daily basis.

Well, here we go.

It felt like noon before it was even 10 am. One of those damn days.

I beat the Pirates of the Caribbean level on KHII, and I still don't know for sure which actors actually lent their voices to their characters. Geoffrey Rush has KHII on his IMDB listing, which could be right or wrong, but none of the other three (Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley) are listed anywhere anymore. Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann both sound very non-starrish, but Jack Sparrow is either Depp or a damn good impersonator.

Actually, so far I've been pretty disappointed with the voice talent in this game, compared to the previous. For the most part, the previous game was able to get back most of the surviving talent to reprise their roles, and they had some fairly decent B-List talent (David Boreanaz as Squall, Haley Joel Osment as Sora, Billy Zane as Ansem, Mandy Moore as Aerith, Lance Bass as Sephiroth, etc) on board for previously unvoiced characters.

Now I understand that you can't get Eddie Murphy to replay Mushu, or Robin Williams to play Genie. You can't get Matthew Broderick or Nathan Lane to come back for Lion King, they're too expensive and too busy on Broadway.

But is it really that hard to get Miguel Ferrer to come back and reprise his role as Shan Yu in Mulan? Hell, the guy worked on Jackie Chan Adventures, for God's sake. Or Sean Astin to do a few lines for Hercules, a character he voiced in the first game? And with the exception of Osment, who plays Sora, the lead character in game, none of the previously-listed B-listers have returned, replaced by new, less talented actors in all cases. The voice work just isn't as good, even in the case of a Mandy Moore/Mena Suvari switch as Aerith. Suvari is a terrible voice actress, I quickly came to learn.

I'm not trying to complain too much, they brought in a few decent names for new roles. Rachael Leigh Cook is playing Tifa, Christopher Lee is on board. Cheech Marin, Robert Guillaume, Ming Na, Harvey Fierstein, the late Pat Morita, all reprising their various Disney roles.

I'm just surprised that none of the actors I mentioned previously were able to be brought back. That was one of the things I really enjoyed about the previous Kingdom Hearts, hearing all these actors that I knew from other work come in and do a very good job voicing characters I had grown to love, either from Disney movies or from previous Final Fantasy games. To see these characters return with horrible voices coming out of their mouths... it's just a disappointment.

There... I DO have something to write about, even if it is just baseless bitching! w00t!

PS: A lot of the links I put on here for the actors at IMDb have them listed in the game. Unfortunately, the listings are wrong. Wikipedia has a more updated listing of the voice talent, and none of the aforementioned actors are on that cast list.

HAPPY LITTLE TREES!!!!

In "Best Game Ever!(!!)" News, there's plans to develop a Bob Ross video game for the DS.

No. Seriously. Bob Freaking Ross. Joy Of Painting. With a friggin' stylus.

SWEET!

Physics-defying hair not included.

Oh, Yeah...

Kingdom Hearts II.

Timeless River.

Greatest Game Level EVER!

Note To Self

Don't you hate it when you have a title for your post, then find out it's nearly identical to a friend's title?

Ah, well...

Note to self:

Do not use a shotgun shell as a flyswatter.

Also, control urge to buy DS Lite in May. Curses.

Climbing From The Bunker

Okay... I think the storm has passed... or at least lessened...

Since February 21st, my credit card and my $100 Target Gift card have endured the releases of:

- Rent ($20)
- Goblet of Fire ($20)
- Condo improvements ($150)
- Two sets of Transformers Universe Constructicons ($40 total)
- Tetris DS ($30)
- Metroid Prime Hunters ($35)
- Kingdom Hearts II ($50)
- Chronicles of Narnia ($25)

I just picked up Narnia... I think... I think I'm done... There's still a few more Transformers coming out in the next few months, but I have a gift card or two to lessen that impact. And I can hold my breath to get Robot Chicken on eBay down the line.

Many are bouncing up and down about King Kong, too, but screw that. I don't wanna spend my hard-earned money on watching a hot blonde ice dancing with a giant monkey.

EDIT: Oh, and that new Playstation controller since my old one decided to start sticking right when I needed the X button. ($20)

Random Goodness

- Second place, baby! I won, um, absolutely nothing!

- After going through the pairing list suggestions, I came to the realization that everyone tended to play it scared. Thankfully I have a friend who's going to jump into the pile and take a bullet for everyone by putting some basic names on her list that no one else put on theirs. You know, the REALLY OBVIOUS ones that everyone ignored because they thought someone else would get to it?

Thanks, Jenn, you'll give us all Harry Potter, Buffy Summers, and Ginny and Ron Weasley. Amazing no one got to it sooner.

- KHII's making me giddier and giddier. It's really difficult to talk about it without giving away spoilers, but in the past night or two I discovered:

1) Olympus is an honest-to-god level this time, not just a "competition" place. You start in Hades. Which rules.

2) Chicken Little is my first summons, but I haven't tried him yet.

3) The level-exclusive characters (Beast, Mulan, etc) have dual attacks with Sora that kick all sorts of ass.

4) If you get killed, you can come back to life right where you left off... but you have to earn it first by controlling an alternate character that I will leave unnamed (although it's fairly obvious if I do mention it) until he can build up enough energy to revive Sora.

- Radio ads are bugging me. First came the extremely annoying Dunwoody ads (what the hell are they trying to advertise?), and the damn 867-5309 commercials (stop it!), but now, in the past few days, I've heard:

1) An ad on sports talk radio in Spanish. Not bad in itself, but I keep asking myself, "if you can't speak English, then why are you listening to sports talk radio?"

2) The revival of a horrific Subway jingle that died in the early 90's and should have stayed dead. And "revival" probably isn't the right word, either: it's the EXACT SAME SONG, the same recording, everything. Not a song I want in my head all day.

Okay, lunch beckons.

Edited

I've just added links to, well, every character listed in the previous post. Cuz, even though most of them are recognizable, most aren't. In one or two cases I had to punt (Vi and Applegate, mostly) but I think they work out alright.

EDIT WITH TITLE!

Finally! trollprincess has finally posted requests for the new pairing lists for ithurtsmybrain. I don't know if she's going to be able to handle it this time, considering she asked for people to post 25 names, and there's currently been 117 responses of 25. Ouch.

Anyway, here's mine, trying VERY hard to not put in anyone who would probably be mentioned by a dozen other people:

1) Shogo Kawada (Battle Royale)
2) Kazuo Kiriyama (Battle Royale)
3) Mitsuko Souma (Battle Royale)
4) Clem (Buffy The Vampire Slayer)
5) Vi (Buffy The Vampire Slayer)
6) Caleb (Buffy The Vampire Slayer)
7) Brainiac (Smallville)
8) Tom Collins (Rent)
9) Mr Applegate (Damn Yankees)
10) Chloe Sullivan (Smallville)
11) Lionel Luthor (Smallville)
12) Brick Tamland (Anchorman)
13) Brian Fantana (Anchorman)
14) Terra (Teen Titans)
15) Slade (Teen Titans)
16) Roxas (Kingdom Hearts II)
17) Namine (Kingdom Hearts II)
18) Leon (Kingdom Hearts)
19) Bigby Wolf (Fables)
20) Jack (Fables)
21) Rose Red (Fables)
22) Pigpen (Peanuts)
23) Rerun (Peanuts)
24) Kid Icarus (Kid Icarus)
25) Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty)

Now I'm just hoping at least one of those characters gets paired up with someone I actually recognize. I wanna write something with BR really really badly, but without a proper venue it just feels, I dunno, screwed up to do a pairing fanfic. You know, doing a Kazuo/Harry Potter or a Mitsuko/Willow (which would be far too much fun to write) just feels all the nerdier and loserish if you're doing it by yourself.

In other news, *headdesk*. I hate this time of year. The time change is an absolute killer for a week or two. I got to bed too late because I wasn't ready for bed, and woke up FAR too early, even though the clock was saying I was right on time, if not running behind.

The fact that I got home about an hour behind schedule because of traffic and weather didn't help. Now I have a week of trying to work with dirty laundry and about 10 minutes between work and rehearsal every night. Why'd I get myself into this show again?