In shock

So my Xbox 360 died. Surprisingly enough, it wasn't the Red Ring of Death, which is the Xbox version of the blue screen of death for Windows. The DVD drive started making horrible noises when it was spinning up a disc and it was no longer able to read the games. This of course happened ON Thanksgiving.

Now when I bought my 360, Best Buy asked me as they always do if I wanted the 2 year in-store replacement warranty. Normally I don't bother with this kind of thing. The technology gets faster and cheaper so quickly that if you get year out of something its probably cheaper and better to buy a new one when it dies than it would have been to spend the extra on the warranty and get it replaced. There are a few items however that its worth putting this protection on. The 360, which is notorious for RROD and other problems, is one of those. So I paid the extra 30 bucks for the 2 year warrant figuring that if I had to pay insured shipping back to Microsoft if there was a problem, it was going to be close to that anyway.

So, I was happy in the fact that I knew I could just take my 360 down to BB and get it exchanged. Problem was it was T-day, so BB was closed. Also, since it was T-day, it meant the following day was Black Friday.. and there was no way in hell I was going anywhere near the mall on that day. So we had to wait til Saturday. I called though to ask what was involved and I was told to just bring my 360 down with the warranty receipt and they would take the hard drive off my old one and put it on a new 360 for me. So thats what I did.

I got there on Saturday and waited about 10 minutes in line. I got to the counter, explained the situation, and the conversation with the girl goes like this:

BBGirl: I need all the cords so we can test it and duplicate the problem.

Me: You need my specific cords? I was told on the phone to just bring the unit.

BBG: Yes, we need your cords to hook it up to test it.

Me: Are you trying to tell me that in all of Best Buy there is not ONE set of Xbox 360 cords that you can use?

BBG: No, we don't keep them around.

Me: You have at least 75 360s under the counter here.. right by my knees and if you are replacing my unit you are going to have to crack open a box anyway. Can you just use the cords from one of those to test it?

BBG: You have to bring your own cords sir so we can hook up your 360 and test it before we can replace it with the warranty.

Me: Ok, I will go home and get all the cords and accessories. Oh, and my you find a growth on you that not even the vast knowledge of science can identify. I will also bring back with me a Yule Log. Being that I am trying to stay with a festive holday theme, I can no longer use a frozen turkey to pummel you about the head and neck region and I will instead use a yule log. Not as quite as satisfying as a shovel, but hey, tis the season!


Ok, I didn't really threaten to beat her with a stick.. but I wanted to. I angrily drove back home to pick up all my cords. This time I brought EVERYTHING. Cords, manuals, headset, network cord, controllers, box, original packaging. EVERYTHING. I even brought one of my 360 games to test with in case BB decided to claim they didn't have any 360 games in the store to use either.

Stood in line .. again. Different girl this time. She took my 360 back to be tested. I told her what was wrong with it. She apparently didn't tell the tester so he hooked it up, turned it on and was playing with the menu system. Well that was of course working fine since it was a DVD drive problem. So he comes over and tells me its working fine. I gave him my game and told him to try and play it. 5 minutes later he comes back and tells BBG2 (Best Buy Girl 2) that the drive is indeed bad and will need to be replaced.

So here is the conversation with BBG2:

BBG2: Ok, if you will grab me one of the 360s under the counter there, I'll get going on the swap for you.

Me: You mean you have 360s right here? Oh wow.. you have a LOT of them. Right here at the testing / exchange are. Convenient. Here you go.

BBG2: *scans new 360* Ok.. looks like the price has dropped on these. In order to do this right, we'll have to do a refund on the original unit, prorate the warranty and then basically "sell" you a new one and put the warranty on that unit.

Me: Whatever you have to do, just make sure I get my original HD on the new unit so I don't lose my downloaded content for Rock Band.

BBG2: No problem, I will have them do that when he bring is over here. Lets get this switched out. *works her magic*

BBG2: Ok, with the unit being cheaper now, that lowers the cost on the 2 year replacement plan. So I am going to have to give you store credit for the difference on the 360 and the lower cost on the replacement plan. You will have a gift card for 51 and change.

Me: So, to clarify, you are giving me a new 360 with my HD on it AND 51 bucks on a gift card?

BBG2: Yep, you will have a whole new unit, so you'll have all new cables, controller etc. as well. Also, since we basically sold you this unit today, you get a full 2 years on the replacement plan on this new unit.

Me: *stares .. patiently waiting for the punch line*

Me: Am I being punked? Where's Ashton? Is he behind the counter?

I couldn't believe it. Other than being misinformed about the need to bring EVERYTHING with me. The procedure took less than 20 minutes and I had a brand new 360 with my HD on it, a new 2 year warranty on said unit, all new accessories and cords, and a 51 dollar gift card. Needless to say, I decided that BBG2 was my new favorite person and I gave the Yule Log to G to hold as we weren't going to need it after all. So we took that gift card and went and picked up the new wireless drum kit for RB2 as once again our RB1 drum kit had broken.

So there we are at the register. I show here all the warranty and replacement documentation for the 360 I have and then she rings up my new drum kit. She jokes about how she is seeing a lot of those being sold both for the fact that its wireless now for RB2 and because the drum kits have a horrible track record for breaking. She rings it up, applied my 51 bucks that was on my gift card and then looks at me and says "Would you like a 2 year replacement plan on this drum kit? It's 12 bucks, but I highly reccomend it as they only have a 90 day warranty and are known to break pretty often".

I couldn't believe it. I didn't even hesitate. The only thing that is more prone to breakage than the 360 itself is the Rock Band instruments. I have been through 2 drum kits already for the original game. I know people who have been through 4 and 5 kits in a year. After my 360 replacement experience, I knew the extra 12 bucks was well worth it to be able to just come in and swap the drums out should they break.. which is quite likely in the next two years. And hell, when they drop in price I can make money on the deal again. :P

Now don't get me wrong, normally those warranties are a waste of money and unecessary, but they can be good values on the right items. So we went home happy and the boys and I rocked out on our new drum kit which is killer by the way. The kit is at least 50% quieter, more repsonsive and has a METAL bass pedal. It's wireless and the pads are velocity sensitive, meaning they play quieter when you are tapping them and will give you loud pounding drum sounds through the game if you are wailing on them. Very cool.

So I left BB a satisfied customer. G looks at me and says what am I supposed to do with this log? I thought how dissapointed I was that I didn't get to try out my new seasonal beat stick, so we went to the movie gallery and asked if they had any employees that like and would reccomend a movie with Kirsten Dunst in it. I am happy to report that while a tad on the unwieldy side, the yule log is an effective melon smasher. Sure, it wasn't Snaggletooth herself, but I considered it a step in the right direction if there is one less delusional person in this world telling people that she is a good actress.

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Thats gonna sting...

Its winter here in the midwest. That means of course cold weather. Its really too cold to just 'be' outside. Sure the kids can still get bundled up and go play in the snow when its here, but its not the same. So here comes thanksgiving day. My brother and sister-in-law were gracious enough to host us at their place for t-day this year and so as we were getting things ready to go, the boys said they were going to go outside til I was set. So they go out with just jackets on .. no hats.. no gloves etc.

About 10 minutes later they come in. Their cheeks are all red. Their noses were red. B puts his cold hands on my head.. and they were indeed freezing. Not to be outdone, but convinced of his own cleverness, his brother doesn't try to put his cold hands on me, he instead puts his hand up and says 'HI FIVE'....

*pause for effect*

For those of you that have never left the desert and don't know what happens when your skin is very cold... it gets itchy, tight and above all else, hurts like a mother if it gets hit hard. So there is G .. sure of his own genius.. standing there with his hand in the air waiting for my high five. He was convinced that I would hit his hand and the cold from his skin would be unbearable for me and he would have his smug victory.

That didn't happen however. I, being wise in my years, was way ahead of him. I was already thinking about giving their frozen earlobes a good flick just for fun, but this presented a far superior option. Queue the Todd:



I gave him a high five like no other. Sure.. I know you are saying that it was mean. Or cruel. But really, no lasting harm was done and it was beneficial for all parties involved. It was immensely entertaining for B and I, and G got a good life lesson! It was tough love for sure, but that is the kind of caring parent I am.

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Give me a break..

I should warn you now .. you might find this post offensive. If you have delicate sensitivities, stop reading.

On CNN I stumbled across this article. The short version of this story is that a 13 year old girl had a myspace page and a 49 year old woman created a myspace page pretending to be a 16 year old boy that was a love interest for this girl. The 'boy' eventually spurned the girl via myspace and she commited suicide over it.

The woman is "charged with one count of conspiracy and three counts of accessing protected computers without authorization to obtain information to inflict emotional distress on Meier, who is identified in court documents as M.T.M. Each count against Drew would carry a maximum penalty of five years in prison upon conviction."

The whole situation is pretty fucked up honestly. Why a 49 year old woman would go to the lengths of creating a fictitious myspace page to pretend to be a 16 year old boy to spurn this girl.. I have no idea. Obviously she has some serious issues she needs to deal with. I have to ask as a parent though.. why does your 13 year old girl have a myspace page? If for some reason you decided this was ok.. how are you not monitoring it? Even if you think its ok and don't think you need to monitor it at all for your 13 year old girl.. how the hell do you not talk to her about the dangers of the internet and make sure they know not everything can be taken at face value?

My problem with this whole thing is that this woman, who is decidedly screwed in the head, is being brought to trial on some pretty weak technicalities because of the fact that the girl commited suicide. Was the woman wrong to do what she did? Absolutely. Should she be pummeled about the head and neck region with a 24lb Butterball? You betcha and I get dibs! This should not be the huge trial that it is though regardless of how fucked up the situation is.

Its the internet people. THE INTERNET. I have a news flash for you in case you are new to the internet. NOT EVERYTHING ON THE INTERNET IS TRUE. Let me give you an example with the following statement:

I am devestatingly handsome and I recently had a threesome with Salma Hayek and Megan Fox.

See what I mean? Only half of that statement is true. I'll let you figure out which half though. Just because I posted it on the internet doesn't make it true. Although if Salma and Megan are reading this and want to make the statement valid.. you know where to find me!

My point before I got off on a pleasant tangent there is simple. That girl, as tragic as her suicide is, had much larger emotional issues than this myspace situation. The myspace thing is a scapegoat. People are looking for someone to blame for the tragedy that is a 13yr old commiting suicide. That doesn't make it right.

Everyone goes through the trauma of being rejected. Having their heart broken. Being manipulate and used. I know my kids are going to go through it. I have been through it. I also am very confident that when it happens they are not going to think the world is over and feel like they need to take their own lives over it. I can't even imagine what that girls parents are going through, but that doesn't make it right to try to pin the blame on one persons actions.. even as retarded and nauseating as they were.

I am all for letting the parents vent some anger and use those little frozen cornish game hens to 'stone' her in a public setting as punishment for her stupidity and then commiting her to an institution to deal with her issues. Pinning the girls suicide on false representations of a myspace page on the internet sets a scary precedence.

I have seen and/or been involved in some pretty fucked up situations revolving around people creating false identities on the internet over the years. One was rather recent and affected not only myself, but several other people I know well. I am not going to go into details, but let it suffice to say that the things this individual said and did were far, FAR worse than misrepresenting themselves on a myspace page. As fucked up as the whole situation was, no one commited suicide over it. Everyone lives, learns and moves on. We try to forget the shitty things that happen and focus on the good things.

It would be a different story if the woman had tried to convince the girl to commit suicide. If there was evidence she was trying to get the girl to do that, maybe this would have more of a leg to stand on. This is just people looking for a scapegoat.. for someone to blame in a tragic situation.

As tomorrow is Thanksgiving and the chances of me posting on a holiday and a day off are slim, let me wish you all a happy turkey day. I hope you all enjoy the time you get to spend with family and friends. Remember to take a minute and think about the good things in your life and be thankful for those people that are there for you, who love you, and make you happy. Those are the things to dwell on.

/cheers
/turkeycoma ON

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The holiday season approaches.

With Thanksgiving only a few days away and xmas right around the corner, I am reminded of one main thing about the holidays. I don't like people. No.. not you. Well unless I don't like you.. in which case, yes.. you. In general though, people turn into complete idiots when the 'happy holidays' roll around.

You know the people I am talking about. Even if you gloss over it and pretend they are not there.. they are. You know.. the jackasses that will cut you off in an icy parking lot to be 3 spots closer to the door at the mall. The people who will take an item out of your cart when you are not looking because they want that for their niece but you too the last one. The people who are rude to the poor checkout person who has been dealing with assholes all day just because an item didn't ring up correctly and it takes an extra 30 seconds to fix it.

I have always found it ironic how a season that is supposed to be happy and joyous often brings out the worst in people. A season that is supposed to remind everyone to be thankful for what they have. A season that is supposed be about giving. Yet a good portion of the population runs into the holiday season and treats its like a bully that is trying to steal their lunch money. It becomes an angry, stressful time. They go at the holiday season like something they have to beat, to win at. They have to beat that bully. They will not be given a swirly by the force that is xmas this year!

Why? Why look at the holidays this way? Its supposed to be about enjoying time with family and friends. Its supposed to be a time to reflect on the past year and your ups and downs. Its a time to look forward to the upcoming new year and what that might bring. Stop stressing about finding the perfect gift. Stop getting worked up over all the things you feel you have to get done for things to go perfectly this year. You know what? If you don't get a card out to your college roommate's sister's great aunt that you met that one time, the world will go on. You are not a bad person.

I would like to point out though that this "don't stress" rule does not apply when it comes to making holiday baked goods to send to me. As I am baking impaired, I rely on the generousity of others for holiday goodness. :P

I am a big fan of shopping over the internet. Sure it appeals to my geek side anyway, but the biggest reason is I don't have to deal with people. I go online, find the item I want and order it. The small shipping costs are totally worth not having to deal with the tools I talked about above. 3 minutes ordering online or hours driving to the mall, parking, fighting crowds, hoping they still have what you want.. no thanks. If you really think about it.. its cheaper to shop online anyway. Between gas driving to and from the store and the alchohol you must purchase to drink away the stress of dealing with idiots at the stores, are you really saving anything shopping locally? I think not.

For the record, it is NOT cool to start playing xmas music full time before Thanksgiving is over. You have a month afterwards, there is no reason for it before turkey day is done. Just don't. My turkey may be thawing, but I am willing to bet it will still hurt like a mofo if I hit you in the face with it. Just leave the xmas music off til afterwards so I don't have to hurt you.

I am lucky enough to be going to visit my family again for almost 2 weeks around the holidays. Its a wonderful thing to be able to spend that kind of time with them over xmas and new years. THAT is what the holidays are about.

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I'm the Prince of Darkness Dammit!

I talked about the Wrath of the Lich King expansion for World of Warcraft.. and now they released a new commercial with Ozzy that I just found hysterical so I had to share. Even if you don't care about WoW or Ozzy .. its still great. Just watch it.

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Winter Wonderland

So I walk out the door this morning.. running late for work as my alarm never went off and the boys assumed I had the day off so didn't wake me.. and BAM .. white everywhere. It snowed that heavy, wet, thick snow. It covers all the branches on the trees and makes them look super cool. We had a couple inches on the ground.. and my car since I never got around to cleaning my garage this weekend and getting my car in there. Damn you Lich King!

I am not sure why the snow was such a shock to me this morning, but it was. I know its winter time. I know it has been cold enough to snow for a while. But for some reason I totally didn't expect there to be snow out there this morning. I love the first snow of the year. I drove to work enjoying the scenery and my mug full of Icing on the Cake coffee. I turn into a coffee junkie in the winter. Makes the morning drive so much better.

It was a different experience driving to work today. See this is the first time driving in the snow with my new tires. Last winter I drove on tires that needed to be replaced for the entire winter. I know it was stupid and dangerous, but tires for my car are expensive. You know how that kind of thing goes. It got towards the end of winter and I kept thinking I made it this far, no big deal now. My tires had very little tread on them so it was quite the adventure learning how to drive in the snow safely with them. I don't suggest it. :P

Anyway, it was nice having traction in the snow again. I felt much safer driving today. Now all I have to worry about is the idiots in the 4wd trucks that insist they can still do 80 in the snow and ice simply because someone put a sticker that says 4x4 on the back of their truck. It never ceases to amaze me that they have a complete lack of understanding of basic physics. If there is no weight on the back tires on a pickup, there is no traction. Period. It doesn't matter if you have 4wd or not if there is no traction. You will just spin the tires really fast with your big v8 engine.

Normally I would step in here and hit these people in the melon with a shovel. However, in light of the cold weather, snow, and impending thanksgiving holiday I have changed my mind. No, I haven't turned over a new leaf, I am just trying to get into the holiday spirit and thus have shelved my shovel. Instead, I will hit them in the face with a frozen turkey.

This idea came to me when we got our free turkeys from work the other day. It was in one of those convenient net carrying bags with a handle. As I was walking out to my car with it swinging, I thought to myself that I was basically carrying a 20lb rock with a convenient handle for swinging it...at the melon of annoying people. How festive is that!?

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Wrath of the Lich King

Most of you that read this probably don't know what I am even referring to much less care about an expansion for an online MMORPG, but this is my blog.. so deal. I have been looking forward to this expansion for quite sometime. I am going to delve into the game design behind MMOs and maybe explain to someone who doesn't play, why I was excited about this expansion.

I have run an online gaming guild for about 10 years now. We have played many different games over the years finally ending up in World of Warcraft (WoW for short) and Warhammer Age of Reckoning (WAR for short). Some of the folks playing WAR have come back to WoW for the expansion.

One of the things that keeps a game like that interesting is the interaction. Any game gets old fast if you are just playing it by yourself. Its like Rock Band for those of you that have played it. I play it solo every now and then, but that gets old real quick. But get a group of people together to play and its a ton more fun. It's the same way with MMOs. Its the people and the interaction that makes it fun and enjoyable. Most nights we'll have 15-20ish people online and on Ventrilo (voice chat software) joking around and having a good time while playing together.

One of the big things to do in MMOs is raiding. Tackling very tough 'end game' level content together. Over the years we have done everything from massive Relic Raids in DAOC with hundereds of people all the way down to heroic instances in WoW which was limited to 5 people. WoW itself, which is where I have played for most of last few years has undergone changes. They used to have standard 5 man instances and then the big raids were 40 mans. The logistics of running a guild or alliance of guilds as we did, to have that many players available on a given night and then coordinating them all to raid together to accomplish a goal was crazy.

I have been a raid leader, the one calling the shots for just about every game we have played. I enjoy it, but it gets very old having to try and keep 40 people at least semi happy and working well together. It got very frustrating trying to keep track of what 39 other people are doing, where your weak spots were, who was causing the problems, etc. Balancing peoples schedules with raid success. Dealing with conflicts. Mediating arugments over loot drops. On and on.

Blizzard made a change with the last expansion. THey opted to move away from the 40 man raids and made the biggest one 25. Our hope was that with this change we could leave the alliance we had behind and do 25 man content on our own as a guild. We did for a while, making it through Gruuls Lair and parts of Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep. We just didn't have enough consistency to really move foward past that.

The problem? Logistics plain and simple. My guild is made up of adults for the most part. Older people with jobs and families and commitments other than playing games 24/7. So when we are dealing with everyone scheduling their gaming / raiding time around sports games and piano lessons and meetings and homework and bedtimes.. it just got to be a headache to try and get 25 people together at one time with 4 hours available to try and get some raids progressing through the content.

Now there are the 'hardcore' guilds. People in that stage of life with no commitments, no desire to do anything but raid. And they do. 6-7 days a week.. often 8+ hours a night. My guild has never come close to that nor had a desire too. So where does that leave the 'casual' raider as far as getting to see content? For both the original release and the BC expansion, there were sections of the game we missed out on all together as they required stuff from lower difficulty dungeons we had not yet completed to get into them.

Why should I .. as an adult player, be unable to see content because I cannot commited 50 hours a week to raiding? Why should I be unable to experience parts of the game because I am unwilling to try and handle the logistics of 40/25 person raids? Blizzard finally listened for this expansion. All the 25 man content they are putting in has a 10 man mode as well. Meaning we can experience the content with only having to deal with the logistics of getting 10 people together which is quite reasonable. The loot you get from the 10 mans is a notch lower overall, but that is not a big deal. Its still very good and really its the challenge of the content we are looking for anyway.

Its very interesting at online games become more popular, how gaming companies are adapting their games and actually listening to their player base to an extent. There were many design changes to WoW with this expansion that made things much easier for the casual player / raider. Its welcome news to the majority of the players out there. Hopefully listening to the people playing the games will become the norm and not the exception to the rule.

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