Ah, Gaming

I love games. Board games, computer games, card games, I love them all. (The Maul?) I personally prefer strategy games and word games, but also enjoy simple card games that are 98% luck. Here's a rundown of games I enjoy.

Board Games

1. Hit or Miss. An excellently fun game with similarities to Scattergories.

2. Scrabble. There is some ultimate version of Scrabble where the board is bigger and you get more tiles, including multiples of the Q, Z, J, and X. Finally, I could spelled quizzed without using a blank.

3. Trivial Pursuit. (Or almost any trivia game.) I've gotten pretty decent at this game, not necessarily because I've become more knowledgeable, but because I've gotten to become a better guesser.

4. Balderdash. It's just a classic.

5. Boggle. While in general I enjoy Scrabble more, I really like games where you start off on an even playing field. Everyone is looking at the same letters, and you can't win a game by the luck of the draw. If the letters are difficult in one round, they're difficult for everyone.

Other board games I've played and enjoyed: Monopoly, Risk, Castle Risk, Settlers of Catan, Starfarers of Catan, Carcassonne, Aladdin's Dragons, Scattergories, among many others. I am going and visiting my family in June, and I look forward to (hopefully) being able to play some of these games that I haven't played in a while.

Card Games

1. Lord of the Rings: Trading Card Game. Of course. One of my two main hobbies in life. (Along with Everquest.) Tonight we are having a card night / computer gaming extravaganza, and this will be one of the main things we do, including opening a bunch of packs of Rings and using those cards in decks. Ah, good times!

2. Star Wars: Customizable Card Game. This is what used to be our main game before Rings, but it still gets played from time to time. There are things I enjoy more about this game than Rings. It's still good fun.

As for trading card games, in the past I have played at least a game of the following: Young Jedi, Jedi Knights, Austin Powers, Magic: The Gathering, Pokemon, Middle Earth, X-Men, Star Trek (First and Second Editions).

I won't go into detail about all the other card game I play (these are not trading card games, like those listed above): Quiddler, Rage, Phase 10, among many others.

That last one is interesting - Phase 10. My wife and I play this a lot. However, in an attempt to make things a little more interesting (we don't have too many games, so there's not a lot of variety), we added some extra phases that we made up, thus making it Phase 15. These were originally our new phases:

11. Set of 5, set of 4
12. 2 sets of 5
13. 10 cards of one color
14. Run of 5, all one color
15. Set of 6, set of 2

However, we determined that phase 10 was rather difficult, and phases 14 and 15 were easier than they should be for being the last 2 phases. So we changed the order and phases as follows:

11. Set of 5, set of 4
12. 2 sets of 5
13. Set of 6, set of 3
14. Run of 6, all one color
15. 10 cards of one color

And this seemed to work pretty well. For now, at least.

Computer Games

1. Everquest II. Of course. This is an MMORPG (massively-multiplayer online role-playing game), and it is loads of fun. I play every Thursday night for 3 hours with my 2 brothers and my sister-in-law (two of which live in Ohio, one lives in New York).

2. Unreal Tournament. I've gone through and beaten the single-player tournament multiple times, but this first-person shooter game is most fun playing multiplayer with friends.

3. StarCraft. This game originally came out in the late 1990s, but it is still the favorite to play when a group of us get together to play computer games. The graphics are not anything terribly impressive by today's standards, but the game play is still excellent fun.

4. Doom. First-person shooter. I have beaten Doom I and Doom II and have Doom III, but while the graphics of the third installment are obviously superior, I actually enjoy playing the first two (especially #2) more. There's less storyline to get in the way, and you can just get right to killing things. The Cyberdemon in the first two games is quite a challenge to defeat.

Other computer games I've played and enjoyed: WarCraft (I-III), Heretic, Quake, Need for Speed (I enjoy pretty much any racing game). I also enjoy video games on gaming consoles, especially any of the MarioKart games. I remember defeating Super Mario Brothers 3 on my computer with a Nintendo emulator. Ah, fun stuff.

Also, for your online enjoyment, I present this time waster:

1. Line Rider. Not really a game so much, but still, I found it to be entertaining. You build a track for the guy on the sled. He can fly around, go around loops, and do flips through the air. However, it can be somewhat aggravating to get him to land right so he doesn't fall off his sled. See the links below:

Line Rider

Video - Cooper's Track 1

Video - Cooper's Track 2

While the fact that I made those last two videos does make me kind of a dork, they were pretty fun to make. Anyway, excessively and needlessly long blog entry over and out. :)

Three Hundred Sixty-Six

Due to recent demand, I have uploaded my full list of movies for your viewing pleasure (I thought posting the list of 366 movies in the blog would be a little long). The list can most likely be split into 5 sections as you go from top to bottom: movies I love, movies I like, movies that I find minimal enjoyment in, movies I dislike, and movies I greatly dislike. Or something like that. If a movie seems out of place, let me know, it might be! :)

Next week I will be posting a blog entry on games - on all the games that I enjoy playing. Yehaw! For now, however, Happy Friday!

Pirates of the Trifle

One more quick movie note. This morning, I watched the first trailer for Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, which releases on May 25. It looks like it has definite potential, and my wife and I have already decided that we are going to see this one in the theatre. I am already pumped. If you feel like it, surf your way over to Yahoo! Movies and check it out.

On Saturday, my wife and I had a special little dinner. She made the main course and the side dishes, and I made dessert. However, the twist is that neither of us knew what the other was making until dinner time, which makes it a little fun. Megan made pork roast for her main course, which was very good. For dessert, I created a chocolate trifle, which was also rather tasty, even though we don't have an actual trifle dish, so I made it in a bowl, and I didn't repeat the layers (not enough room). So, while it might not have been as pretty as the picture on the recipe, it was still mmmm-mmmm-good. While the trifle was still rather easy, it was a step up for me with baking (in the past, I've made mix-in-a-box cakes and cookies, that's about it). So I'm working my way up. The next time we do this type of dinner, I will likely do the main course and side dishes. So, well, that'll be interesting.

My Blood Type Is Nerd Positive

I cannot deny the truth. I am an impressive mixture of geek, dork, and nerd. Why cover up the facts? Thus, I shall broadcast it to whatever poor people read my blog. Below is my newly-updated list of favorite movies. Previously, my list of movies included only those movies that I somewhat liked (it contained 190 or so movies). Now the list contains every movie I have ever seen that I remember enough to judge. This list is ordered from my favorite movie of all time (see below) to my least favorite movie of all time (Breakfast at Tiffany's), and includes 365 movies. Don't worry, I won't put the list here, but below is my top 50. The fact that the top 7 spots are claimed by Lord of the Rings and Star Wars movies only solidifies my geekiness. I even have thick glasses to top it off. The Mac Man will be pleased at the relative positions of #28 and #35, but will become severely depressed at the drop suffered by #30, which used to be in the top 15.

1 Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, The
2 Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The
3 Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
4 Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The
5 Star Wars: Return of the Jedi
6 Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
7 Star Wars: A New Hope
8 Gladiator
9 Matrix, The
10 Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl
11 Serenity
12 Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, The
13 Signs
14 Shrek
15 King Kong (2005)
16 Braveheart
17 Matrix: Reloaded, The
18 Star Wars: Attack of the Clones
19 Star Wars: The Phantom Menace
20 X-Men: The Last Stand
21 Cars
22 Fight Club
23 Se7en
24 X-Men
25 Minority Report
26 Saving Private Ryan
27 Office Space
28 Princess Bride, The
29 300 (2007)
30 Shawshank Redemption, The
31 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
32 Raiders of the Lost Ark
33 Terminator III: Rise of the Machines
34 Terminator
35 I, Robot
36 X2: X-Men United
37 Troy
38 Terminator II: Judgment Day
39 Toy Story II
40 Batman Begins
41 Sixth Sense, The
42 Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
43 Toy Story
44 Napoleon Dynamite
45 Incredibles, The
46 Collateral
47 Patriot, The
48 V For Vendetta
49 Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
50 Day After Tomorrow, The

If Only My Salary Matched My Car's Mileage

Well, I had my two year review at work yesterday. It went well, and I got a raise, though not as good as I was hoping for. Maybe my expectations were higher due to the very good raise I received last year. Oh well, it was still perfectly good. My boss did talk about moving me in a different direction in the company, doing more ASP web programming. And they will be physically moving me in the next few days to a different desk, so I can be sitting near the guy who I will be working with on such projects. It's a bigger desk, which is just peachy.

My 2000 Cavalier recently hit 150,000 miles. It's getting up there. I had been planning on taking a picture and/or video of it when it was at 150,000 miles exactly, but a little bit of irony got in my way. I've driven that car just over 100,000 miles since I bought it, and it hit this milestone during my wife's 180 mile round trip down to see her mother, when I stayed home. What's with that? Ah well. But when the car (hopefully) hits 175,000 and 200,000, I will (hopefully) be able to do that. Cause, it's nerdy, but, you know, I'm a nerd. So it's all good.

I, like a lot of people, have filled out my NCAA basketball tournament bracket. On ESPN.com, The Cooper Clan (Mom, Dad, my 2 brothers, my sister-in-law, and my wife) has our brackets so we can compare how we're doing. Right now, after the first day of the first round, I am in last place, tied with Erik. I am even losing to the random bracket I generated using an Excel spreadsheet. Megan (my wife), on the other hand, who chose the winners partially based on whose name sounded cooler, is tied for second. Hmmm.... maybe my whole strategy is flawed.

And They Say There's No God

There are some things in life that make me wonder how anyone can believe there's no God. One of these things is a sunset or a sunrise. It's like God painted it right there on the horizon. It's amazing to me to think that people believe this world is one big cosmic accident when I see things like this. The Bible says that God's presence and existence is obvious through His creation, and I see that presence everywhere. Everything else in His creation shouts his existence too, from the majesty of the mountains to the power of a roaring river, and from the vast varieties of Earth's creatures to the faces of his people. Everything points to the wonder of God.

Three Hundred

On Sunday, Megan and I went to see the movie 300, viewed on Marcus Theatre's Ultrascreen. We both liked the movie, both giving it a score of 8/10. Megan said the movie was very pretty and very well done, so it got a lot of points for quality, but it was a little bloodier than she'd prefer, so it lost some points for enjoyability. For myself, I thought the battle scenes were fantastic, but it lost some points due to some unnecessary nudity. However, I liked the action sequences and the tone of the movie. I am currently redoing my list of favorite movies, so I don't know where this will end up yet, but I would guess it would land in the top 30 or so.

It turns out that the Marcus theatre we go to is playing some "older" movies on the Ultrascreen. They are currently playing Jaws, and I believe will soon be playing Ghostbusters and Terminator, the last of those I would thoroughly enjoy seeing on the big screen. All I have to say is, if they ever play Star Wars or something like that, I am going to go see it. Cause that would be sweet.

Randomness

As my wife and I were driving away from a friend's house on Sunday night, I pulled up behind a car at a red light. The light turned green, and the car in front of me went forward. A second after it had cleared the intersection, a car came along from the left, running its red light. I don't know if the guy was in a hurry or was not paying attention or something like that, but if I had been closer to the car in front of me, I would have been blindsided by the other driver. And you know, that would have been a bummer.

We may go see the movie 300 on Sunday. It looks to have the potential to be good, and I hope it lives up to expectations. Battle scenes, all sorts of good stuff. It'd be even better if I could fast forward through the pointless sex and nude scenes that I've read are in it. I'm hoping to be able to see it on the Ultrascreen, but we'll see. We haven't been to a movie in ages. I don't know if I've been to a theatre since we went to see Pirates 2.

On the topic of movies, this summer should be excellent. I am looking forward to the following movies, listed in order of excitement:

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Transformers
The Bourne Ultimatum
Shrek the Third
Spider-Man 3
Ocean's Thirteen

All but one are sequels. Thus is Hollywood I suppose.

Job-related Babbling

As I have mentioned before, my two-year review should be coming up. In fact, tomorrow is my two-year date for working at FLS. Whether or not my review will be on time is yet to be seen, but I'm hoping it'll be close. I decided a while ago that this year's raise will be one of the major determining factors for how much I look for a new job. I like my current job, but am still pretty open to something else. Megan and I would like to buy a house in the next couple years, and may have to replace a car or two over the next couple years as well, so bringing home a little more bacon would be most helpful.

Those goals will also be more attainable once Megan has a job and we have two incomes. She is currently going through the steps with Kelly, a temp agency. So hopefully something good comes from that.

That all being said, I randomly came across a job listing that would be nearly perfect for me, except one thing that I don't know about. It is a programming position for a website, and I would be doing ASP.Net programming, among other web-related things. The company is based in New York, but I would be able to telecommute full time from home, which would be sweet. The only thing I don't know about it is the salary. I applied anyway, so we will see if anything comes from that. Working from home full time would be a major plus for me.

AC's Skippers Club

We ended up not going on our Adventurous Christians camping trip after all. Well, six of us didn't at least, the rest of the group still did. The six of us stayed back for a few different reasons, including the weather, children, dogs, and school. But we made the most of it, and had ourselves a fun weekend, hanging out and playing games together. On Sunday, we went snow tubing, which was excellent fun.

Last Wednesday, we lost in the opening round of the volleyball playoffs. We played pretty well in the first game (which we won) and about half of the second game, then things went south, and we lost the last 2 games. But alas, it was still a good and fun season. And softball is only a couple months away. We are playing in a co-ed league, as opposed to last year, where we were on an all men's team. I believe this year's team name is The Beauties and the Geeks. Yeah that's right, we're cool.