Game Review: Guitar Hero 3

The long awaited Guitar Hero 3 came out this weekend, and it is pretty much what you would expect. It has a whole bunch of new songs, including some great ones like Paint it, Black by the Rolling Stones and Even Flow by Pearl Jam. There are also a lot of other solid songs, but the problem comes when you reach the later songs in the game - they have to be difficult to play, and thus they are generally unrecognizable. This is a problem in all of the Guitar Heroes, so I guess it is to be expected.

One thing you'll notice pretty quickly is that the game is much more forgiving than GH II. The timing of the notes is very generous; it seems like you have almost twice as much time, both before and after the note, to hit it and have the game register it as struck. Hammer ons and pull offs are similarly generous, meaning that you can just wail through particularly long stretches of solos without too much difficulty, and even keeping your multiplier. I'm not sure what I personally think of this change yet, but I guess it makes it more accessible for everyone to play.

There is a new "battle mode," where instead of star power you get the ability to make your opponent's playing more difficult, by either removing a fret temporarily, making him whammy a lot before being able to play notes, playing double notes for awhile, etc. This mode is just stupid. It basically is "make sure you hit your powerup or you'll lose," and even then it depends on what powerup you get. If someone lefty flips you, or whammys you at the right time, you're goosed, and thats the end of that. Making this more more annoying is that it is incorporated into career mode. Luckily, you don't have to actually win your battles against Tom Morello or Slash in order to progress, but it is just kind of stupid to have it sitting in there, where it clearly doesn't belong.

There is a new co-op career mode, which seems promising. It has a few extra songs that you can unlock that are not available in single player career mode, such as Sabotage by the Beastie Boys. Unlike battle mode, this is a good idea, and is well implemented too. Unlike GH II, it seems like they have created different star ratings for co-op play, so both you and your partner will have to do fairly well in order to five star a song.

Graphically, the game looks much, much better than GH II. The venues are more detailed, the fans look individually good, and the player characters are all very well done. There is a counter that pops up now if you have a streak of over 30 notes hit, which is a nice touch as a boon and a curse. You get to see how far along you are before hitting 300 or 400 in a row, but it also makes you look at it and not at the notes every now and then, which invariably leads to you missing. Star power also looks a little bit different, in that it pops up as bulbs you fill up instead of a meter.

Overall, I recommend the game. I'd probably recommend it for the songs alone, because new songs are always welcome. But the graphics make it look real nice, and while battle mode is stupid, noone is actually forcing you to play it. There is also an online component for it, but we haven't tried that yet, and I doubt we will, as there are three of us here anyway who like to play.

How does he know what I was trying to do? I was so upset with the whole thing I started crying.

This is the same guy who was involved in the August Betfair scandal where "irregular betting patterns" arose in a match he mysteriously lost against some putzo.

For some reason, I don't think $2,000 is going to be enough to deter him throwing matches. Especially when the Russian mafia is involved.

On August 25th, 2005, Mr. Kennedy made his WWE Smackdown debut. His first match with with Funaki, whose gimmick was that he claimed he was Smackdown's #1 Announcer. Mr. Kennedy soundly defeated him, putting all of the WWE on notice that the most talented mic worker since The Rock had arrived.

Mr. Kennedy's next feud was with Tony Chimmel, a non wrestler. Chimmel was the ring announcer, and Mr. Kennedy took exception to his crappy introductions of the wrestlers. Mr. Kennedy would refuse to allow Chimmel to introduce him, instead doing his own introductions.

I weigh in tonight, at an incredible two hundred and forty two pounds.

I hail, from GREEN BAY, WISCONSIN!!!!

MISTER...... KENNEDY!!!!

...

...

KENNEDY!!!!

Suffice to say, a star was born.

Soon enough, the WWE made his entrance and self-announcement more elaborate. They would drop down a boxing / radio style microphone from the ceiling, and cut all the lights in the arena except for a center light on the ring. I can't find a great clip of it, but here is a clip from the 2007 WWE Video game that can give you the gist of what he does. Of course, his real trademark is saying his name twice.

Mr. Kennedy is a heel (bad guy), but much like the Rock, this has not stopped him from being beloved by the fans. He has blazed a trail in the WWE, defeating such big names as The Undertaker, Batista, and Chris Benoit. He has held the United States championship, and he won the Money in the Bank ladder match at Wrestlemania 23, which guaranteed him a WWE championship match whenever he wanted it. The future seemed limitless. However, an unfortunate injury occurred that looked to put Mr. Kennedy out for a year, and thus he was forced to relinquish his Money in the Bank. Making matters even worse, is that after he gave up the title shot was given to Edge, it was discovered that his injury was not as severe as originally thought. Currently, Mr. Kennedy is feuding with Jeff Hardy over the intercontinental championship, and hopefully the main event will be in his future once again soon.

What is the point of all this? Well 2 reasons. One is that a bunch of us are going to Smackdown at John Paul Jones arena on January 23rd. UVA Law invades Smackdown! While Mr. Kennedy is on Raw, we're hoping that he will either switch shows or be of such a status that he kind of goes whenever he wants. Second, and more importantly, is my most recent Ebay purcahse. Perhaps my greatest purchase ever.



An autographed Mr. Kennedy picture. And look at the autograph. He signs it, "Mr. Kennedy... Kennedy!!!"

It will be a very sweet day when this photo arrives.

Movie Review: The Last 30 Minutes of "Click," which I halfheartedly watched while playing poker.

Adam Sandler is a man who is focused on work. So much so that he ignores his kids and his incredibly hot wife (played by Kate Beckinsale). He somehow acquires a magic remote control that works in real life. For a short time, he has fun with it, probably using it to make his work go better. But then the remote malfunctions or something, and it starts fast forwarding him in life uncontrollably. He sees his wife leave him, his kids ignore him, and his own self grow big and fat. He continues to put work ahead of family until his deathbed, when he finally repents and realizes that family comes first. He then wakes up in Bed, Bath, and Beyond, and finds that it was all a dream.

Don't watch this movie.

Wrong. Seattle is still the ugliest.

Movie Review: 30 Days of Night

Here is a picture of Stella (Melissa George) from the movie. She's hot.



She's the only thing that is good about this movie. This is the real world Medellin.

For those of you who didn't watch Entourage this season, the guys were trying to sell Medellin to people who haven't seen the movie yet. They had a spectacular trailer of it, and tried to sell it based on that and hype. When the movie was actually shown at Cannes, it bombs spectacularly.

30 Days of Night has spectacular trailers and commercials. It makes you want to watch it. But there were a few problems.

1) Its not scary
2) There are a ton of scenes that just don't make sense
3) The characters are really annoying

Lets take these in reverse order.

You basically want the characters to die because they act in such a retarded manner. The vampires are roaming the streets... all you have to do is wait it out until the sun comes up in 30 days. What do you do?

Well if you are the characters in this movie, you do all of the following. You leave your safe hiding spot that the vampires don't know about. You go find a snow plow to try to take out as many of the vampires as you can before inevitably succumbing to their numbers. You try to save a little girl who is clearly bait, when in a scene earlier in the movie, you recognized that the vampires use that tactic. And then... while you are in yet another safe hiding spot, you decide to inject yourself with vampire blood in an attempt to save the moron who decided to save the girl.

A lot of the characters die. But not nearly enough.

There are also a ton of scenes that just do not make any sense at all. In the snow plow scene, the guy ends up crashing into a building. He has a box of flares with him, and in his final attempt to kill as many vampires as possible, he drops a lit one into the box, which creates a huge fireball and explosion.

In the next scene, we somehow see the guy who dropped the flares... and he seems relatively unscathed. He is lying on the ground, not showing any burn marks or anything. And then he gets his head caved in by the head vampire.

There is also a scene early in the movie where we see two of the characters investigating a huge pile of burnt up cell phones. Apparently, we are to believe that all the cell phones in the town have been stolen and destroyed. While this is beyond implausible, lets imagine that it is the case. 20 minutes later, we see Stella with a cell phone, calling Evan, who has a cell phone as well! They both have cell phones!!! Their phones clearly were not stolen or destroyed. So why aren't they calling the outside world when the vampires start attacking?!?!

Lastly, the movie is just not scary. Everything is pretty predictable, and people don't even die in really gruesome ways. The movie is actually kind of boring. It is just people hiding, and occasionally they get stupid and try to find a new hiding spot for no apparent reason. Great.

Sorry, there were a ton of spoilers in this review. That will just encourage you to not see this movie.

Freezing is a common method of food preservation which slows both food decay and the growth of micro-organisms. Besides the effect of lower temperatures on reaction rates, freezing makes water less available for bacterial growth. - Wikipedia

I know that I have read before about how freezing only slows the growth of micro-organisms, it does not halt it completely. Of course, earlier this week I ignored that knowledge completely, when I cooked up some chicken breasts that had been in the freezer for quite some time.

Since November of last year, to be precise.

They tasted a wee bit funny after I cooked them, but I continued to eat them, because I was hungry. And what was the worst thing that could happen? 1L year the oven stopped working because of a power outage, and I had some chicken cooking in the oven at the time. I knew it was going to finish cooking with the residual heat, so I made a fire and attempted to wrap the chicken in foil and then cook it in the fireplace. It didn't work out very well, but I ate the partially cooked chicken and there weren't any ill effects.

Well, this time there were problems. My stomach has been killing me for the last couple days, a pain that has stopped only when I either (1) ate food or (2) drank alcohol. Luckily, it seems to have abated today... although I would not be surprised if it returned later this afternoon.

I think the lesson here is that if you cook by fireplace, things will be okay.

Currently, the front page of ESPN correctly identifies the problem of the scheduling of the baseball postseason, but is wrong as to why it is a problem. Jim Caple, in a classically vague and nebulous statement, says:

There is a reason Detroit played so poorly in last year's World Series, and it quite possibly was due partially to its six-day layoff between the ALCS and World Series.

There's a reason... okay. Quite possibly it was partially X. Bold.

But I digress. The real problem with the baseball postseason isn't players getting out of their rhythms (this would happen anyway, as the Rockies have swept the Diamondbacks, while the Red Sox and Indians are still going on), but the fact that the postseason schedule does not mirror the regular season.

In the regular season, players play at least six, and usually seven days out of the week. This has the effect of straining bullpens, tiring out catchers, and having managers use their fifth starter. It is a war of attrition - if one team has to use its bullpen extensively two days in a row, the next day many of their arms will not be available. Each game is not self contained, as it has effects on the future games as well. The regular season rewards a team's depth.

The postseason does no such thing. Fifth starters are no longer necessary. You might actually face a number one starter three times over the span of seven games. A team's top catcher has no problem catching every game. Bullpens are pretty much always rested. By placing off days in between every two or so games, the postseason does not value the same things that the regular season does.

And that is the real problem with the scheduling we have right now.

Of course, I have the same problem with the Super Bowl. What's wrong with the Super Bowl? The halftime show. During the regular season, halftime lasts 15 minutes. That is 15 minutes for players to rest and get fluids, and 15 minutes for coaches to view film and make strategy adjustments. It is not a lot of time. However, how long does halftime at the Super Bowl last? Whatever it is, its longer than 15 minutes. And that rewards "slower" coaches and players who are not as well conditioned as others.

I guess I'm a purist at heart.

And the prayers of the people of Atlanta have been answered.

The parking lot at our school consists of three rows. The entrance faces the middle row, and both the left and right rows are accessible from either the front or back of the middle row (and vice versa). So you are faced with a choice when you enter the parking lot. You can go down the middle row, or you can go down the left or right.

Spots are sometimes at a premium in the lot. If you can't find a spot, you have to drive to a farther away lot, and if you are lugging your laptop and a law school book or two, it can be a terrible walk. So the question is - if you are about to enter the parking lot, and there is one car behind you about to enter it as well, what row do you go down?

The answer, pretty clearly, is that you go down the middle row. The reason is that by doing that, you effectively get the chance at a spot in two rows, as opposed to just one. If you pick the middle row, you then can watch which way the putzo behind you picks. You speed down the middle row, looking for spots, and then quickly turn at the end of that row to the row the putzo did not choose. As long as you were not driving at like 5 mph, you will get there before he or she can make the turn. And then you are totally free to find your spot in the other row.

This seems like common sense. And yet recently I've been on the happy end of one of these exchanges. The person in front of me inexplicably chose to go down the right row. I zoomed down the middle row, and luckily found the only spot in the lot. As I got my stuff out of my car and walked towards school, she gave me a dirty look as she drove off to the loser lot.

It was her own fault.

This past weekend, Kim and I started looking at places to have the ol wedding. The first place we looked at was the Liberty House in Jersey City. This is what the webpage looks like:



Looks pretty nice right? Lots of windows and NYC in the background. Very picturesque.

This is what we saw when we drove up.



Kim: Is that a municipal building?

We tried to reconcile the picture with what was sitting in front of us. It looked nothing like what we saw. True, we were there during the day, but unless solid walls turn into windows when the sun goes down, this was not the same building. Kim suggested that maybe this was the view of the back of the building, which is plausible. Except... if you are looking at the back of the building, you do not see the NYC skyline. You would only see the skyline if you were looking at the front of the building.

So here is what the Liberty House people did. They took a picture of the back of the building (probably)... and then superimposed the NYC skyline in the background, in order to create a picture that is physically impossible.

Suffice to say, we won't be having our wedding there.

Your offer, from the prospective of a guy like me, is plain and simple a cr@ppy business deal. Here's why. Cutting through all the B.S., what you suggest is a simple trade: you bring your looks to the party and I bring my money. Fine, simple. But here's the rub, your looks will fade and my money will likely continue into perpetuity … in fact, it is very likely that my income increases but it is an absolute certainty that you won't be getting any more beautiful!

Thanks for the heads up on this funny read, Tim.

Here is something that is much funnier to law people than non-law.

An Open Letter to the Colorado Rockies:

You are practicing the economics of defeat. With every run you score, your hitters grow more tired from running around the bases. With every home run hit, your players become more likely to have a season ending injury from swinging too hard. With every nasty slider your seeming endless parade of left-handed pitchers throw, their likelihood of Tommy John surgery increases exponentially. And with every defeat you hand to the Phillies, the pressure on your team to close out this series goes up. For your own good, you need to stop this dismantling of the Phillies.

If you hope to eventually win the World Series, you must concede victory to the Phillies for at least the next two games, and probably the next three. It is well documented that teams need playoff experience to win the World Series, and your team has very little of it. Therefore, it is imperative that you lose now in order to gain this valuable and necessary experience, thus making a World Series win next year possible. Additionally, losing this series would ensure that your players do not subject themselves to the peril of up to 14 additional post-season games, each of which would involve hundreds of pitches that could result in crippling, career ending injuries to players who would be integral to your potential 2008 World Series run.

Furthermore, it appears that you have won 16 of your last 17 games. If you defeat the Phillies tomorrow, that will be 17 of 18. Clearly, it doesn't take a statistician to realize that if you sweep the Phillies, you are DUE for a few losses, which would knock you out of the playoffs in the next round. It would be much better for you to come into the playoffs with a .500 September record. Just look at what the St. Louis Cardinals did last year.

Teams must not mortgage the present at the cost of their future. Therefore, Colorado Rockies, your course of action is clear. In order to ensure your absolute best shot at winning a World Series, you must immediately capitulate to the bumbling mess of white and red that you are currently throttling. Do so, or face the consequences of your own hubris.

Phillies v. Rockies Analysis

Starting Pitching

Lets be honest here - there is only one good starting pitcher in this series, and it is Hamels. He is just plain nasty, and gives the Phillies a huge edge in game one. After that, it is kind of a push. Kendrick has been solid as a rookie, giving up more than 4 runs in only one of his twenty starts. He doesn't strike out many people, but he doesn't walk many people and keeps the Phillies in the game. Moyer is old and cranky, and the quality of his starts may depend on whether or not a Matlock marathon comes on the day before.

Other than Ubaldo Jimenez, I can't name any Rockies starting pitchers. I had to look them up. If you had told me that Jeff Francis was in the major leagues, I would have been surprised, let alone that he stumbled his way into 17 wins this year. For all I know, Morales might be a villain from a Harrison Ford movie. If he is in fact one of those villains, you can bump the Rockies starters up a notch.

Edge: Phillies

Offense

The Phillies scored the most runs in the National League this year. When you take into account park factors (Coors Field is 1.16, Supposed "bandbox" Citizens Bank Park is 1.03), the difference between the offenses becomes even more apparent. All you have to do, really, is just analyze the lineups EqAs.

Rollins (.290) v. Matsui (.258)
Victorino (.271) v. Tulowitzki (.269)
Utley (.321) v. Holliday (.319)
Howard (.315) v. Helton (.308)
Burrell (.303) v. Atkins (.278)
Rowand (.293) v. Hawpe (.297)
Dobbs (.263) v. Spilborghs (.283)
Ruiz (.255) v. Torrealba (.235)

Edge: Phillies

Bench

The Phillies have Werth (.297 EqA) and Iguchi (.278) as their top pinch hitters, as well as Michael Bourn as a speedy pinch runner and defensive replacement for Burrell. My glance at the Rockies roster only yields Willy Tavaras (.260) as their only relevant bench player. Check.

Edge: Phillies

Bullpens

The Phillies have gone with the ol "three washed up closers" method of getting the ball to Brett "The Backhand" Myers. Corpas has been particularly solid for the Rockies, and Fuentes could be problematic for the Phillies if the Rockies starting pitching can actually get a lead to him, which is unlikely.

Edge: Push

Defense

The Rockies ranked 8th in team defensive efficiency. The Phillies, not surprisingly, ranked 19th. However, this isn't football. Defense doesn't win championships.

Edge: Doesn't matter

Intangibles

The Phillies completed one of the most epic comebacks in division race history, storming back from 7 down with 17 to play against the hated Mets. The Rockies, on the other hand, are only in the playoffs because of a blown call by an umpire.

Edge: Phillies

Lock Box Prediction

The Phillies win the series in 2.33 games (The Rockies will concede after being down 10-0 after the bottom of the third inning in game three).

Here is an account from Jimbo, who went to the Phillies game on Sunday.

I was fortunate enough to be at the best Phillies game I could have ever been to. My buddy Chris had the Sunday season ticket plan, but lives in North Carolina. He was planning to fly up all the time, but apparently forgot that he is a poor bastard and only made two games all season. My friend Jon and I got his tickets for free and sat in left field behind Pat the Bat, about 10 rows up among all the other season ticket holders, all of whom knew each other real well and turned out to be cool as shit.

About twenty rows behind us was that bar thing, so all the TVs had on the Mets game before the Phils started playing. As Jamie Moyer was running out from the bullpen, the Marlins went up by five so everyone in our section was flipping out before anything even started. I know I must have sat down a few times, but I was pretty drunk so I was up on my feet for most of the game. In the bottom of the first, our entire section was chanting "Pena sucks" and this lasted until about the fifth. I think it was a ritual for that section. Also, these four black dudes were chanting "we love fat girls" at random times - awesome!

It was pretty unbelievable that the Mets were down by seven as the Phils were still in the first. Jamie Moyer came out hitting his corners and the fans were on every pitch. Obviously when JRoll started off the bottom of the first, 44,850 people were chanting "MVP, MVP", which was awesome cause he got a hit, stole second with no problem, then stole third on what seemed like the next pitch. Oh the rally towels were flying baby! Chase hits a sac fly and Phils are up 1-0. Next inning we changed it up to "Pena sucks Willie."

Okay, Phils get the bases loaded and Howard singles in two runs. By this point it seemed like it was 95 degrees outside and most people were wearing their rally towels as protective hats. Marlins go up 8-1 and we chant "Let's go Marlins", which felt kinda weird, but good job Fish. When JRoll hit his triple I thought the bleachers behind us were going to fall in. It was unbelievable, for real Jimmy, you wait for your last at-bat to get your final MVP number...you're the freakin’ MAN!!!

Bottom of the ninth and everyone is up with the towels flyin. I thought my arm was going to fall off by this point, but I was smart and kept switching rally arms as to save some energy. I was pretty much freakin’ out at this point due to the situation, but more so the pure energy around me. I think there was one out when the "F" went up on the out of town scoreboard in right field, and somehow the Bank got even louder. I had never been a part of a huge game like this before, so it was amazing how the noise level just kept growing when it seemed like full blast already. Brett "The Backhand" Myers ends up striking out Willie Mo Pena for the final out, and that was the last I saw of the field. I missed the entire rush of players onto the field as I was hugging random people and jumping up and down like the drunk fool I was. Fireworks were set off, people threw their towels and hats and kids in the air and a few people even rushed the field. It was the greatest pro sports event I have been a part of, that is until they play for their 11th win of the postseason.

GO PHILS!!!

*Here is a nice little graph, courtesy of Fangraphs.com, that tracks the win probabilities of yesterday's game. The biggest play was Howard's 2 run single.

For those of you not in the know, here is a definition of win probability.

*Here is an article about how the Phillies fans' reacted. Surprisingly, no violence (reported). Here is the Mets fans' reaction.