tha-roooooooooow back!

YouTube - MC Hammer - U Can't Touch This

today, nba-wise was kinda bittersweet for me. more bitter than sweet though.

magic won at the expense of the bulls. that's mainly why it was bittersweet. one of my favorite up-and-coming eastern teams was going to fall today regardless, but i was at least hoping it would be closer. dwight's amazing though regardless.

and pistons lost.

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sometimes i can't use statcounter.com to determine who actually visits my journal, because i do actually come back to it quite often seeing if anybody's commented. thus bloating up the number of unique visitors. who the hell would want to comment on my site anyhow?

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wanna know how to piss people off without saying a word? stare at them until you get their attention. don't look angry or happy. just have this intense look in your eyes. keep your gaze right on them for a long period even after they lock eyes with you. then roll your eyes, shake your head and turn away. sigh if you want for added effect.

(note: i have not tried this yet, because while there's a couple of things that people do that annoy me, i am not that willing to anger others like that)

fyi, i really dislike it when people talk to themselves out loud.

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i now have evanescence and guns and roses' cds. fallen and greatest hits, to be more specific. ac/dc was also on sale, but since i could not find "there's a long way to the top," i declined.

target store-exclusive nerfs:

big bad titan

big bad bow

me and jerm saw the big bad bow, didn't see the titan when we went to target on friday.

the bow's kinda kewl; reminded me of our ol nerfwar days, but it's more like the crossbow and less like the actual bow me and jerm used to have. it still looks cool, and maybe i MIGHT buy it sometime in the future. it comes with 6 arrows.

i like the titan more though; that thing maybe only has 2 arrows and they look really different, but check out the distance you can get with that thing; it's like a missile launcher!

bulls looked sick... loved it... especially when tyrus thomas came over to help and blocked shaq, and the two putbacks; one by thomas, one by ben wallace.

now get your broken nose healed thomas before you play against the kings.

if the bulls keep this up, i would LOVE to see the bulls meet the pistons for the eastern conference finals this season.

thought out of sheer boredom i'd post some scans from the school newpaper; they let you use the scanners for free:


weird advertisement for jack in the box; it's a coupon on the back. but this was like o_0 for me...


study in taiwan ad... yes, i was surprised too, but these have been popping up a lot more frequently in the davis paper; it showed up like ziltch in past years.


this one's special... i usually don't eat out unless i'm pressed for time, and only at a fast food restaurant. redrum used to print out these in the newspaper ALL the time. redrum is like a more expensive, more higher quality, slower-moving in n' out. so i'd usually go and use the buy 1 get 1 free coupon and get 2 1/3rd lb burgers(i think that was the largest you could order burger meat lb-wise without a combo), and since the original price was 7.00 something, i'd basically pay 3.50 or so for a really good burger. twice. now, they don't print these coupons out as often in the paper, and the last time i checked, when they do, it's not buy 1 get 1 free; it's buy 1, 2nd item's half off. this was the last coupon i found that had this exact offer. good times.

life seems so *eh* right now... should i be happy that batman beyond season 2 and jlu season 1 are out, as well as the nba starting this week? maybe... but it really all seems so superficial. "cheap thrills." don't deny it; this is the truth.

i stopped hatin on amare once i came to grips that just because he's on a defensively poor team does not mean he sucks. i will definitely watch him a LOT more closely this nba season(and hope his knees don't kill him, like mcdyess). i'm actually surprised how mixed the bag is in terms of predictions for nba champs this year at espn.com. no pistons picks(can't blame em though; flip's gotta first show that he can be more than just a season-long coach, and also a deep postseason coach), only 1 heat pick(again, can't blame em, although the fact that they overwhelmingly pick the heat to win the eastern conference again baffles me), tons of mavs, spurs and suns picks. mavs and spurs are a given, but surprised how a lot pick the suns. i call rockets as a darkhorse in the western race as well; they have bonzi and shane now.

*sigh* i just wish dwight howard would get monstrous already as well as bwall's bulls so i can stop hearing about how the western conference is so much better than the eastern conference.

this is so cool; i get to watch the bulls TWICE next week!

opening night against the heat,
then thursday against the kings.

hopefully i get to see wallace and thomas take the floor at the same time.

fyi, i saw brandon roy preseason against the kings. aside from the kings winning most of the game, roy looks pretty good.

R.I.P. Red Auerbach...

the best NBA coach ever...

cool little freeware game i found

shift is to use your current weapon; unarmed you punch; takes 2 hits to knock out an enemy; if you punch them from behind you instead strangle them and kill instantly. armed it fires your assault rifle. you also punch when you want to activate or deactivate switches, or get people to follow you/stop following you.

hold down ctrl to sidestep.

z either primes a grenade and released, throws it if you're unarmed, or reloads your rifle; careful; unlike in counterstrike; once you reload, you lose whatever bullets are in the current clip.

x switches between rifle and bare hands.

instructions are in japanese, but it's not too hard to follow.

YouTube - jump on it

while looking around on orlandomagic.com for new dwight howard wallpaper, i was surprised to find out they were offering 25% off online purchases, and that one of the dwight howard jerseys was on sale for 19. too bad all of them were sold out :D

anyways, on the wallpaper page, i was surprised to see how they had a special section for former orlando magic "alumn" as they liked to call it; ben wallace, tracy mcgrady, shaq, horace grant, etc, ewing(when did HE play for them?) all here. granted, a couple of them blossomed AFTER they left or won championships elsewhere(ben*cough*shaq), but i liked that special touch; no other team has respected their former great players like that.

hopefully, dwight won't have to end up in that section, because he'll win one in orlando.

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espn asks a blogger:

"What would it take for you to get a tattoo of the Warriors' logo on your chest?

Guess who was the head coach of the Warriors the last time they made the playoffs? (Hint: It wasn't Mike Montgomery, Eric Musselman, Brian Winters, Dave Cowens, Garry St. Jean, PJ Carlesimo, Rick Adelman, or even Bob "NBA Cares" Lanier.)

That's right: Don Nelson. Nellieball is back in the Bay Area and Warriors Nation is thinking playoffs. A first-round playoff sweep? We're Warriors fans -- we'll take it!

And that tattoo of the Warriors logo? We're the most loyal fans in the entire NBA -- we each already sport more of those than all of Allen Iverson's tats combined. "Unstoppable baby!"

• Atma Brother No. 1 and Fantasy Junkie of Golden State of Mind"

lol...

i agree; most bay area people would be MORE than happy to see the warriors get swept in the 1st round of the playoffs.

and 2nd on the "most loyal fans in the entire NBA." takes a lotta nerve to be a warriors fan.

(i would like to add seeing ike make this his breakthrough year as an all-around post player would really be nice)

these should make your day...

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hehehehe

"There has been no sign of the ninjas."

this is awesome on so many roflcopter levels. watch the video and see how fast they move.

but why would they crash a truck in order to do this? ninjas don't loot. seems more like pirates posing as ninjas. UNLESS... they were ninjas posing AS pirates posing as ninjas.

are you a bad enough dude to rescue the ATM?

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some commando and spaceballs clips; i should rewatch both of these movies; i fondly remember spaceballs, not so much commando aside from the very cheesy line arnold says at the end of the movie(let off some steam, bennett)

commando trailer

let off some steam, bennett

lol no reloading?

spaceballs - ludicrous speed

we're at now now

i lost the bleeps the sweeps and the creeps

old news, but you stumble unto what you stumble:

gene for manliness

of course, i wouldn't take it for word; i'll probably look to see if there's a legit article on ncbi on friday...

quiz on friday.

i realize i usually don't link to really good football videos on youtube.

that's cause i usually don't watch them.

well, first time for everything huh?

i like these two:

nice video of ol skool nfl tackles
just watching this made me realize how much more tougher the niners d was back then... *sigh*...


the best stiff arm you're ever going to see

man's videos, heh...

michael straham's awesome.

so was eli manning.

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i don't even know why i dislike drew bledsoe so much. but eh; he's sackbait.

i wonder how long til t.o. explodes. anybody wanna make a call as to his next outragous outburst? i say 2 weeks if things keep going the way they go.

3 blocks in one game i think...

can't remember all of them, but 1 of them was on terrance coming over to help. another might've been on jon, can't remember the 3rd. and i need to improve my endurance. i know i can rebound a lot better.

i rewatched the youtube clip on how bill russell guards two players, and then some ben wallace video. there's a lotta good things they do right there that a lotta players don't do in trying to block a shot. it's all about their spacing between their opponents, how they tense their legs, what they make their opponents think they're going to do or can do. but they're able to do these things b/c their hops enable them to cover more space, so they can back off their opponents, for instance making them think they've got a wide open shot, then jump and take that shot away.

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i used to watch a weird cartoon when i was a kid; i think it was called "danger mouse;" didn't even know how i could watch that crap; there were a lotta things i used to watch as a kid that were nothing.

fyi, a lotta cartoons you watched as a kid werent necessarily that high quality.

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oh yea; both batman beyond season 2 and justice league unlimited seasons 1 and 2(i believe they're bundled together) come out tomorrow on sale. big fan of both; watched batman beyond a lot when i was a late teen, and i watched a lot of justice league unlimited shows on cartoon network during college. i intend to get both seasons this weekend. J.L.U. is particularly interesting, b/c it's the 6 core members of the justice league(superman, batman, wonder woman, green lantern, flash, hawkgirl, martian), but now everybody else in dc comics, or at least most of them are involved; green arrow for instance, supergirl, etc.

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sweet tomatoes had baked sweet potatoes with maple syrup cream this weekend(yes, i went with my mom). soooo good. makes me want to buy some sweet potatoes and maple syrup.

i seem to be in a "baked potato" phase anyhow.

i hate my professor.

he talks too fast, doesn't write down what he's talking on the blackboard.

when i'm trying to review what he's saying from the .wav file i record in class, i have to rewind 10x seemingly at the same spot to get what he's saying. and even then, a lotta times, i can't.

kg?!?

what the heck was he doing in taipei on a show like that?

another borat trailer

borat on conan

you lik-a make sex crime-hi five!

Trailer for Borat's new movie

hahah... borat's funny

this is how you stiff-arm in football

don't know HOW i found this, but check out this product, it might crack you up.

it's DDR for christians!

dance dance praise-alution!

damn, i wished i didn't have any notes to study tonight, so i could've watched the entire bears-cardinals game. matt lineart was GOOD, but bears pulled a come from behind.

bears are really, really good this season. they're getting comparisons to the ditka bears of old the way the pistons used to get comparisons to the 96 bulls last season.

lazy sunday

roflmao

YouTube - Mad TV - Parody of "Deal or No Deal"

on the internet: back up your mouth with your name...
in real life: back up your mouth with your actions...

2nd one's pretty well-heard. the 1st i think needs some explaination; i just really hate it when someone says some really outlandish claim, and they have a really fake name to back it. so that if you couldn't tell who they were, as if it would give them some sort of shield. for instance, last year i read something like this on the web when the kings were sucking(and didn't have artest yet):

kings will make more than 50 wins, and they'll make the playoffs.
-sactown

or last sunday on fox football:

to is the worst wide receiver ever
-phillyphool

i understand that we all have weird quirky internet names and such, but i believe what i'm trying to say is this: if you're going to make an outlandish claim, then put your name behind it, for crying out loud. otherwise you're just telling me that you won't say those words when your buddies aren't there to back you.

-richard tsai

se-ga-ta san-shi-ro!

soccer
baseball
bomberman

japanese sega commercials F.T.W.

found this while searching for youtube videos on amare stoudamire:

amare wrecks havoc in less than 1 minute

no wonder sam likes him so much... damn...

and this is probably my favorite putback of all time:

ben wallace vs the suns

i actually have the realtime clip on a cd at home; i'll try to update that once i go home near the end of this month.

John 16:33

These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In this world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.

-such comforting words

check this

click on "understanding the king james bible;" this chapter was taken straight out of the author's book "new bible versions" which i have; i consider this guide in the appendix in the back to be a very good guide for understanding the bible better.

the best thing i like about the introduction is that the author reminds us that the bible is a spiritual book; hence the distance between us understanding the bible is not words, but sin. hence why we don't necessarily self-help books in order to understand the bible better. he points out that jesus used the common language of the day with peter, but peter was not able to understand him.

this guide is partially why i wanted to start memorizing bible verses again. it will help you to think about God more often during the day.

(fyi, while you're at the site, check out the author's credentials.)

Gheorghe Muresan! want to smell like me?

More Gheorghe Muresan!

i still can't find the snickers commercial where he's desperately trying to nail a half-court shot backward while saying "for the kids." that was the absolute best commercial ever. EVER.

i'm gonna try my own weak-sauced version of podcasting...

stay tuned...

(the benefits of having a voice recorder on your mp3 player)

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Another free batch of music downloads, this time from Tooth and Nail Records

I think you need to sign up first, but for 30 songs, that sounds fairly good.

FYI, Anberlin might be my favorite non-popular rock band. i seem to always go back to playing "a day late" on my player.

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i skimmed chris liu's latest entry.

and in response, one of my "mini-goals" for a future house(assuming i make a decent amount of money) would be to get a dog AND a cat. the dog's gotta be like Ace in Batman Beyond, and black(basically a silent badass). the cat, well, gotta be a tabby. i always loved both types of pets, as opposed to people who just like 1, and always wanted to know how'd they get along in the same house. not all cat-dog relationships are hostile.

and i have to get them at the same time when both are kids, so the dog doesn't straight up rip the cat up upon sight.

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gonna end this entry by posting up a short list of artists on my mp3 player; probably will miss a couple:

12 stones(cd)
alter bridge(cd)
anberlin
bush(cd)
chris tomlin
creed(cd)
downhere(cd)
dragonforce
guilty gear xx#r soundtrack
guns n roses
jeremy camp(cd)
jewel
joe satriani(cd)
lifehouse
lincoln brewster
linkin park(cd)
megaman 2 - dr. wily stage 1(haha... it's catchy)
metallica(cd)
michelle branch
pearl jam(cd)
pillar(cd)
relient k(one song)
sanctus real(cd)
santana
the presidents of the usa(cd)
timothy james meaney(cd)
tree63(cd)
u2(one song)

basically, lotsa rock, rock-pop, classic rock, instrumental rock. and christian.

the pearl jam are 6 songs from their "ten" cd, one of their earlier, more successful cds. which is why i sincerely believe lifehouse, pearl jam, and creed do not sound the same; vocals are the same, but the guitar work is just too far apart.

pearl jam guitarwork > creed guitarwork > lifehouse guitarwork.
that being said, mark tremonti was not allowed to cut loose on creed.
alterbridge guitarwork > pearl jam guitarwork. although what type of guitar style you like listening to is of course preference; mark is a lot more high shredding on high distortion.

enough talking; i gotta eat.

Remember this?

i get chills everytime i watch something on this guy...

Raaaoooowwwwlll...

hahahahahahahahhaa...

2 roads diverged in a wood...

if you think about robert frost's famous poem, there is a benefit to taking "the road less travelled;" you run into less traffic, and so you can cruise through with the greatest of ease.

but if you take what Jesus said about taking "the road less travelled," you realize it's not necessarily faster; the road width is thinner, and razor-straight; there is significantly less room for error.

(you see, if you go by what Frost said, then as a Christian, you should run into less conflict from others; but if you think about what Lord Jesus Christ said, then you realize all the conflict comes from yourself; it's not the multitudes of people which hate on you for being a Christian, it's how you react to it; nobody's taking the steps along that road for you; only you are)

i believe that what is popular is not necessarily wrong(though most of the times it is) or right, but many people simply do what is popular because everybody else is doing it, without thinking about the inherent value(or lack thereof) behind what they do and think. it took me until i was deep into college ie my 2nd or 3rd year to realize that.

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niners, eagles, bears all win; saints won by the heroics of bush; it's a good sunday for football.
(i hope now drew bledsoe knows to keep his mouth shut about taunting defenses to go ahead and blitz him; i saw him repeatedly get hurried or get his passes blocked against the eagles, which is probably the most rush-happy defense in the league)

bears might be the best team in football as of right now.

yankees and dodgers are both knocked out; it's a good week for baseball.

should be quite clear now why dragonforce's songs, especially the solo parts are so long

damn, that's crazy shredding... by both guitarists

Free music CD from Inpop

just found this today... hey, it's free... might as well take it...

fyi, i've heard tree63's version of amazing grace, because i have their live cd; it's fairly good.

this is the vw commercial i was talking about

fyi, if you visit the website listed at the end of the commercial( v-dubsrock), not only can you take a look at the vw which enables you to plug your guitar into the vw, there's some guitar lessons on it; cool eh?

fyi, dunno why anybody would want to buy a car JUST so they can play their electric guitar whenever they want; not saying it's unuseful, but if you want to play anywhere you want, there's the mini amps. and if you want to play with quality sound, there's of course the other amps you would buy.

i guess this would only be useful if you liked playing in parking lots. a LOT. or on camping trips; should've mentioned that.

or if you want to try ghost-riding while playing fenders and ibanezes, heh.

anybody see the latest volswagen commercial where there's a lead guitarist riffing away, and his electric guitar's connected to 6 vw's as an "amp?"

that guitarist is Slash, the guitarist for Guns and Roses. very good guitarist i think.

good stuff; i love "You Could Be Mine," and there's a ton of other songs i love that they have.

if i could list 5 rock bands i really liked that are from "back then:"

metallica(they've been going on a long time, but yes, their sound used to be slightly more shredding back then; Master of Puppets is a good example)
guns and roses
joe satriani
ac/dc
van halen

there's probably more; i always forget how many classic rock bands i used to listen to. these are just 5 i really liked. i don't think i ever heard steve vai.

oh yeah:

my bro loved Rush. come to think about it, i really like their song, "Tom Sawyer."

Aerosmith and KISS were good too.

good ol teen days where i would just sit around in my room listening to 92.3 FM.

madtv r&b parody

heh heh...

I find this picture on wiki's page describing how to use chopsticks humorous. Step 3 looks a tad absurd.

it'll be interesting to see how the new nba ball does; i just recently read more info on it on espn.com and spalding.com, and it looks kinda cool, but at the same time i heard a lotta negative reviews on it.

speaking of which, i intend to get a new spalding basketball anyways; one specifically for just outdoor playing, not indoor-outdoor. the one i've used for such a long time is just so worn down that it's impossible to grip it.

i need to wash my flippable jersey and headband.

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not sure where spalding.com gets their info, but:

"basketball is the most played team sport in the U.S. with more than 32 million people playing in 2005."

"in 2004, almost 8 million people said that basketball was their favorite sports activity, far exceeding the number of people who said any other team sport."

Stanford professor receives Nobel Prize

crazy... and his contribution was something related to genetics... RNA interference...

i'm gonna read some of his articles on pubmed later...

mcnabb's clearly on a mission; you can say what you want, but i think he feels that he needs to show that this team got where it's gotten because of him, not T.O. that's why the eagles are doing so well.

ravens are also the hotness. with mcnair, now it's not just ray lewis anymore.

some people like to compare t.o. to artest. i think t.o. is actually better compared to dennis rodman. the similarities are a lot more poignant there. they both went downhill once they had no more idols to look up to.

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i don't like/get myspace because of the way the page design is; it looks very cluttered. maybe that's why i don't have an account. for me, i don't necessarily post here because i want the whole world to know about me; just want to throw stuff off my chest. don't really like xanga either cause it seems mainly teenage asians are the ones using that, and always coming on with stuff like you'd want to listen to their day and stuff.

what i would really like though, is if there was a blogging site that let you upload .mp3's easily or .wavs, or stuff like that. i'm not always near a computer when i'm thinking, y'kno. but i usually have my mp3 player with me. then again, if i want to go through the trouble of recording, walking back to my computer, going to another website, uploading, then logging into blogger, linking back to the mp3, i'd be wasting a crapload of time too.

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thank God for third chances...

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i'd try cs: source this weekend, but my cpu doesn't have a lot of memory; maybe i'll just reinstall cs 1.6 until my cpu has less stuff on it. cs:s is 3+ gb.

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i have 1 video uploaded to my youtube account(same name), plan to upload maybe 2 more.

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i think it's only fair i cut myself off from youtube.com, shoyuken.com, and combovideos.com for a week or two. i think it's taking up too much of my time.

Ridin Dirty parody

omgoodness, i can't stop laughing...

think i'm too white and nerDAY...

the end does not justify the means

YouTube - Futurama - Scary door

ahahahahahahahaha...

i love this clip

YouTube - Conan on Futurama

YouTube - Futurama Ikea Parody

YouTube - Futurama s2e6 clip

YouTube - Futurama-Funniest Openning EVER

YouTube - Futurama hey sexy mama

hahahahah...

YouTube - Ataru381 - MUST SEE!!

that video just made me realize my chances of getting a girlfriend are not THAT low...

YouTube - Dwight Howard Blocks Shot

beast...

blocking one for uncle sam eh?

Crazy Pen Spinning Done By Japanese

i like the jrock guitar tracks they lay down in the background. maybe it might be on napster...

(rival by mintjam)

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skool has started... i is a college stoodent.

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(edit: mintjam offers a couple of their tracks, including rival, for free in .mp3 format on their website; no need to visit napster)

YouTube - Mad TV - You Sound Like Me

hahahaha...

YouTube - Mad TV Spoof on Sprint Text Messaging

mad tv's awesome...

Reason why Japanese arcades thrive so much more than American arcades, and hence why their competition skills are so much better than ours

the general consensus is that american ppl in the world play on consoles so much more because the difference in quality is really marginal now, that you don't need to go to the arcades to get high-quality arcade play.

but this is probably the best post i've seen on srk.com regarding this topic:

Originally Posted by fubarduck
Everyone sort of nailed a little bit of it, but not the whole reason. Sorry for the long post, but you guys need a culture lesson.

Yes, it is a culture difference. Population density is one factor.

The main reason that the Japanese culture revolves around riding trains to get places and thus meeting in public to do hang out. Yes, there is driving too, but typically most Japanese people live far away from the main downtown/city area where everything happens (which is always right next to a train station). So, when you leave your house in Japan, you are out for a while. You don't just drive/go somewhere and come back home (most esablishments don't even have parking, and if they do, it is pay parking)--when you're out, you're out and when you come home you're not going anywhere far for the rest of the day. You walk or take a bus to your nearest train station, which takes anywhere from 5 to 45 minutes depending on your closest train station, then wait for a train to take you to the nearest downtown area.

As a result, people don't just go hang out at other people's houses. First of all, they're smaller, and second of all many younger people live at home with their families until a much older age than in the US (since apartments are so expensive, especially in Tokyo area). It's a very big deal for a Japanese family to have visitors, and you definitely don't go just to hang out and play video games for a while. As a guest in a Japanese home you're expected to give your full attention and speak to everyone in the family. Also, people's houses are extremely inconvenient to get to, since they're typically far away from their closest train stations.

So, Japanese society is built around giving people places to hang out in the main area of each city near the central train station. This is why there are tons of coffee shops, karaoke bars, and drinking restaurants (which there is really no equivalent to in the US) all over town. Game centers (arcades) are just another one of those establishments--it's just a place where you can play video games with friends or with strangers. When people play video games at home, it's typically RPGs or adventure games which can be enjoyed by themselves. This is why it's never a big deal when the big fighting games do not come to console, or get arcade-perfect console ports. There is no need to own a joystick, PS2, or any fighting game to play fighting games competitively in Japan. You can get all the practice you need just by playing at the arcade, and arcades with fighting games here typically carry Arcadia magazines which have more detailed move lists and strategies which are free for anybody to browse.

This is why game centers (arcades) will never die in Japan. You do not play fighting games at your house, because people do not come over to your house to hang out, you meet them in public where there will always be coffee shops, karaoke, drinking restaurants, and game centers to meet at and hang out. Additionally, even for online games, Japanese gamers typically play at Internet Cafe's, not at their own house or apartment!

America, on the other hand, is a culture that revolves around driving and cars. In most areas you typically have to drive to get anywhere, and meeting friends at their place to hang out is pretty common practice. So, there is no point in going to an arcade to play video games, you can just do it at your friend's house. If you haven't noticed, the only places in America that still have typical "arcades" are places with lots of foot traffic--malls, university areas, and downtown areas. These esablishments would not be making money any other way, because the typical American would not have any reason to go to an arcade unless there is one around where he is travelling/hanging out by foot.

When the arcade scene was huge in the US, there was a distinction--the video games you could play at home were no where near as great as what you could play at an arcade. But now, games available on consoles are either arcade-perfect (to the average gamer's eyes) or even better than that. This is why the arcade scene died in America but is still going strongly in Japan.

So, now there are very few arcades, and the truly hardcore fighting game players still in the US all meet right here on SRK.com. If you want a true, hardcore arcade scene that will never ever disappear, move to Japan. The future of gaming in the US is at home, which means for competitive gaming, online is the future. For fighting games, this is bad news right now because of the limitations of current technology, but hopefully when Internet 2 rolls around latency will become much less of an issue and the hardcore fighting game scene may see a revival.

i've always wondered exactly what type of shotgun the t800 uses in T2. the way he empties a shell and puts another back in doesn't look like the atypical pump-action shotgun. so i looked around a little on the web; here's what i found:

-10 guage shotgun
(guage determines the size of the barrel; i forget what, but most shotgun guages range from some large number to 12; 12 is police issue. the lower the number, the bigger the barrel(ouch))
-sawed-off
(you don't really realize this, until you think about it, but it's true; if arnold was using a non-sawed-off barrel, it would look a lot more like a rifle. it doesn't look rediculously short, or glaringly obvious like in t1 when kyle reese actually took the time to saw it off, but it's there.)
-repeating shotgun
(doesn't mean it's automatic; means that you can put a couple of shells in there and you won't need to reload for about 5-8 times)
-was made by winchester.

the last one's the reason why it cocks the way it does. winchester used to make rifles like that; where you had a large hammer to displace a spent rifle bullet and insert a new one. when they approached him to make a repeating shotgun, he consented, but stated that it'd be much better for them to make a pump-action shotgun. winchester would eventually make a pump-action, but for i think about a couple of years, they made these ghetto shotguns.(go read wiki if you want more info)

that's why you don't see many of those winchester shotguns anymore; a pump-action simply is faster at "reloading."

nevertheless, after you watch t2, and seeing how arnold coolly flips the shotgun around while driving the bike to reload it, you'd probably wish you had one too.

YouTube - Terminator 2

favorite movie when i was a kid... gave me nightmares like crazy though.

i love when arnold's taking the shotgun out of the box, cocks it and steps on the roses. bgm's awesome during that moment.

YouTube - street fighter - daigo vs justin or steve vs julie?

i can't stop laughing...

in case you don't get it, just youtube "daigo justin" in the search engine and watch the very 1st entry(or watch the 3rd entry for the entire match)

YouTube - Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series (Episode 1)

hahahaaha... this is a funny parody series...

YouTube - Ms. Peachez - Fry That Chicken

hahahaha...

what's next? ms. peachez - eat dat watermelon? drink dat kool-aid?

RIP Steve Irwin

wow, richard's actually going to say something deep on his journal. weird, eh?

---

when the pilgrims stated "cleanliness is next to godliness," this exact phrase isn't found in the bible(at least, I have yet to find it in the KJV). HOWEVER, if you look at the numerous times the Bible states for Christians to abstain from uncleanliness, I think the inference is quite clear. Of course, we know the apostle Paul did not literally mean that being messy is a sin. however, I have noticed that when you can summarize a person's habits as "neat" or "tidy" they tend to be more in control of things that are going on.

i personally, might come to realize that i don't have an exact method to which i want to approach my day written out in stone, not just listing what i want to do, but in what order i should do it, that i might end up screwing myself 10x over(see [1]).

so, in the interest of trying to change things, from now on i'm going to try to write down an entire list of what i'm going to do the next day, in that order, before i go to bed. maybe things will be different tomorrow. i pray it will.

---

[1] i think for myself, my laziness tends to come from not being hard enough on myself. thanks for all the support and advice people have given me these past years of my life, but ultimately, i already know what i need to do, but if i don't feel like bringing myself to do something, i can't bring myself to do it. in order for you to keep me from doing what i don't want to do(as opposed to me keeping myself), you'd need to literally watch me 24/7 in the same room. the change, as they say, needs to come from within. i believe that i am slowly changing, making little strides, by learning what makes my mind wander or tick in moments of self-reflection, but i have much more to learn about how my mind works, and how i can bring that to usefulness, mainly, doing what i don't want to do.

Ghost Ride the Whip!
(Ghost Ride the Whip!)

whitie style

azn style

the 2nd one had me dying...

YouTube - Japanese Gameshow

YouTube - Whose Line Is It Anyway?: Party Quirks

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha...

YouTube - Indian Superman

don't ask me how i found this one... i did not find it in the first place by searching "indian superman"

YouTube - Robot Chicken - Rodigitti (208)

tan wang, do the noise! damnit wang, do the noise!

YouTube - Robot Chicken - The Password is Swordfish (210)

the batman spoof and soccer skit did it for me...

YouTube - ??????????

6 japanese wrestlers vs a house...

Dirk Nowitzki

very good video; almost made dirk look like kobe in that video

YouTube - BACK TO THE FUTURE by the Angry Nintendo Nerd

ahahahaha...

YouTube - Air (SMB1 Hack) NES in 09:12

wow...

(read the description)

i've got to find this hacked version of the game and find out how to do those glitches...

according to the book i am reading, 1st john 5:7,8 is the STRONGEST argument for the trinity in the king james bible. it states clearly that there are 3 that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost. john has also stated in the gospel that he wrote, that the word became flesh.

it has been changed in ALL other bible versions.

(Jehovah's Witnesses do not believe the trinity, or the Godhead exists, and don't believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God; without this verse, it is much more difficult to convince them that the trinity does exist)

there haven't been many greek manuscripts which contain 1st john 5:7,

HOWEVER, the evidence for it is still very strong: there have been numerous manuscripts in other languages which contain it, and many church fathers back then quoted it; it was just not found in a lot of manuscipts; what gives?

two possible reasons:
1)scribal error: the three that bear witness in verse 7 was confused to be that of verse 8, hence the accidental skipping of a line
2)numerous cults believed that God was all-inclusive(or something like that where the entire world make up God)

i'd post more, but library's going to close; this should give you something to chew on for a bit.

YouTube - Batman snickers ad

if you ever, EVER, find the snickers commercial where then nba player gheorghe muresan is in it trying to repeatedly make a half-court shot facing away saying "and score one for the kids", then breaks down sobbing at the end, please give it to me... i can't find it at all.

sometimes, i seriously wonder why i don't like jason kidd and the new jersey nets

i mean, almost every basketball fan i know likes jason kidd...

and i ask myself, why don't you?

casual fans like him because he seems to find people out of nowhere...

devoted fans like him because he's not only a very unselfish player, as a passer rather than a scorer, but he's also a very good defender; this past season he was on the 1st all-nba defensive team.

first of all, i don't HATE kidd... i merely have a LOT more teams i like compared to the nets. but lemme give some possible reasons why i don't like the nets more...

-nets have never really been a team with bigs that i really liked. used to like kenyon martin, but then he left. i tend to like bigs who are either good all-around, or monsters on the defensive end.

-in some strange way, the more i think about it, i like players who can score more than those who can pass. yea, i was surprised when i initially thought about it, but the more i think about it, i think it rings true. it's not that i don't like players being unselfish; no, otherwise, i'd be a laker fan by now. i like players who can pass AND create shots by themselves. i think i can sum it up this way:

when it comes to offensively-efficient players with the ball, i like:
the scorer who can pass rather than the passer who can score; the 1st would be like billups, the 2nd would be like kidd.

of course, a good passer needs to have court vision, but i just feel in more ways than not, that when you are a scorer more than a passer, the passing oppurtunities tend to create themselves. if you have a reputation for being virtually unguardable 1 on 1 in the waning seconds of the 4th quarter, the help defenders know they can't simply just stick out an arm in order to throw you off; they must actually come over and commit. that means someone is going to be WIDE open.

(it's also a more inspiring story when you hear of a scorer becoming more and more selfless trying to find others rather than a passer trying to become more of a clutch player)

put it this way; hypothetically, suppose you are a power forward defending against a pick-n-roll situation at the end of the game; the power forward on the other team is robert horry; classic example of a role player who can't create his own shots, but leave him wide open at the end of games, and you just buried yourself.

his teammate is either jason kidd or chauncey billups, and has the ball. your point guard teammate is a decent defender, not a lockdown defender, not like nash. all of your other teammates are guarding well, not intending to double.

i personally would rather face the kidd/horry combo than billups/horry. just because i would have a little more faith in letting my teammate guard kidd one-on-one. if i do need to double, i wouldn't necessarily need to run all the way over with my hands up, just stick my hand in there.

so, does this now make chicago a powerhouse in the east again?

heh, i wish the pistons' starting 5 stayed together(i like the defensive combo of ben and tayshaun way too much), but i DID like the new-look bulls even before wallace came over. i like noccioni and tyson a lot.

so, the team that pretty much led the league in fg % now just got that much sicker.

but in some ways, you were expecting this; if they did not fire flip(drastic measure but hey), there would be a pretty good chance they were going to keep trying to become better offensively. they're still good defensively, but this is a MAJOR LOSS, especially considering if they continue to keep an offensive-minded coach.

my apologies if you're trying to reach me in the past few weeks in some way related to the internet, ie email, waiting for my blog to show some signs of life; haven't really checked my email; will do so this friday or saturday. i'm lazy-weird like that.

---

so the nba finals were over 2 weeks ago. i will just make this thought on the nba short, b/c it's over for this season, and i have no reason to go too indepth on the subject, i will just make 5 statements about the nba that if you wish, i can elaborate on the next journal entry.

1)heat won this year not b/c of their offseason aquisitions(jason williams > damon jones, but james posey = eddie jones, and walker didn't do crap), but because riley was the head coach and dwyane wade and shaq were healthy; most importantly for the players' part, dwyane wade was better and healthier.
2)i would actually like the heat if they did not have... walker(yes, that's right, not shaq, walker; you see, what comes out of shaq's mouth can be obnoxious sometimes, but at least he has the skills to back it up; walker can't do anything without the ball, but everytime he gets an and1, he feels obligated to do that ugly waggle butt dance that he does)
3)funny how when the spurs and pistons win the championship, espn.com's all like "they have all the pieces to repeat next season" but when the heat win, they are a bit more skeptical, b/c of age; well, at least it shows espn guys aren't drones.
4)i actually like dwade out of the 3 "phenoms", ykno, lebron, melo... i like his offense better and his defense seems to be better than either of the two. and he banks :D
5)i was kinda hoping this year that the pistons would meet the spurs again in the finals, seeing how hungry for revenge the pistons seemed during this season. unfortunately, it couldn't happen, but i will say that an occasional change of scenery during the nba finals really never hurt anybody.

---

in reflection, i actually liked reading a lot; it's just that i never liked reading on other people's terms; ie for a class, before this week is over so the library books i have can be returned w/o being overdue. so i present to you the list of books i have as of right now in my room that i would like to get done with by the end of this summer:

an understandable history of the bible - dr. samuel gipp *done*
new age (bible) versions - g.a. riplinger(i hoped i spelled that name right)
the art of war - sun tzu(translated by john minford)
the case for a creator - lee strobel(given to me by my msm counselor)

i would also like to get "mythic past" from barnes and noble; it's a book debating the validity of the bible; you see, as i'm still trying to increase my collection of books arguing for the validity of the kjv bible, i would also like to look into books that debate the kjv vs other bible versions, but i haven't looked at a book that says the bible is not truth based on EXTERNAL factors; would be interesting to read it just to see what type of arguments the author makes(and whether those arguments have any counter arguments; they always do)

---

lucky enough to find bible software for the niv at fry's; you see, i want to be able to compare the niv up against the kjv at home, it's easier to do if you have search software to use, and i have the kjv for free on my cpu, but the niv is copyrighted, so you actually need to purchase it. still wasn't too expensive; 9.99

---

i wear SO MUCH stuff when i play basketball now. it used to be just "to look cool" which was why i originally wore the green headband, but now, my body's just like screaming after every day i play if i'm not wearing stuff. i wear wwjd and a rubber bracelet everytime i play, but then, i always wear that, so it's kinda moot.

-white headband(it's a special fiber, so it feels lighter and sucks water away; very, very, good); used to wear it b/c it looked cool, but now i'm getting used to it actually working quite well especially on a hot day, as it keeps the sweat from running down my face, and it can be used to slightly tuck my glasses in so they won't fall out as easily
-starting to wear those things that tuck your glasses in now as well, btw
-fingersleeve(wear it on my left ring; never got sprained, but sometimes when i played it would hurt, so i do this not to get that feeling anymore)
-gels that i wear to cushion my balls-of-my-feet; i get these nasty calluses on my balls of my foot if i don't wear them, and since they slide around all the time, i'm going to get tape now as well
-jumper's knee strap(i dunno if this is a recent occurance, but sometimes my left knee aches after games now)

and that's excluding the fact that during winter and fall, i like using the nike elbow band and nba shooter's sleeve to help me keep warm.

---

whoa, too much typing; i just wanna say one more thing:

if you like watching cartoons on youtube.com, try searching with these words:

jlu secret origins

very nice; should bring up a 1 hr cartoon about the justice league; i enjoy it greatly, because it shows how the justice league(superman, batman, wonder woman, hawkgirl, green lantern, and the flash) came to be; for some reason, i'm a really big sucker for the very 1st episode, and maybe the last episode of cartoons; shows how things were set up, and how the heroes came to don their responsibilities, as well as how they closed things off.

closure...

and yet, it's not...

b/c i don't have a good feeling about one of my classes...

like i said before, i really hope i don't have to come back this fall...

that being said, even if i didn't have to come back, i still really don't know what the hell i'm going to do...

whatever God's will is, God's will is

---

burned my last cd today... that's it... all my data on my cpu is now on a ton of cds. funny how it came down to this... i came into this college with nothing on my laptop, and i will leave with nothing on my laptop(as i'm finally going to defragment that slow ass cpu tonight). now, i won't ever have to worry about being sidetracked when using my laptop, b/c all the data will be somewhere else; available for me to use, but not within easy reach.

---

according to the wiki, dwyane wade is a christian, b/c he's tithed to his church back in illinois. christians are so hard to follow in the nba nowadays; nobody's as outspoken as david robinson and avery johnson. that being said, here i who i THINK is christian:

ben wallace(wears a wwjd bracelet)
chauncey billups(said "God is good" when he received the 2k4 finals mvp)
antonio mcdyess(wears a wwjd bracelet, i think)
jason richardson(prays before every game)
dwyane wade
dwight howard(obvious reasons)
alonzo mourning(points his finger to the sky during games a LOT)
michael redd(gave his dad a CHURCH)
jermaine o neal(sketchy on this one; i've heard he prayed before, but then it's hard to say you're a christian when your track record has you rush-punching a pistons fan)
richard jefferson(parents were missionaries)
antoine jamaison
michael finley
allen iverson(? not too sure; wears wwjd)

help me add to the list; who else? or did i get anybody wrong?

fyi, stuart scott asked avery johnson if he'd ever tell his players that he loved them(coach brown did it in game 6 vs spurs, and the pistons responded with a win)... i loved avery's response, it was along the lines of "no, i don't need to do that, because i tell them every moment off the court that i love them. they know it, and i always allow jerry stackhouse's kids to come and stay over and eat all my food." (sounds very asian christian parent-like, doesn't it?)

---

in retrospect, i look back at college, and i have to admit, i learned stuff... but it was never in class. you see, while i may have picked up random things about modern biology, i believe in the end all that knowledge was superficial, and i probably couldn't recall it in a heartbeat. times flies... regardless of whether you're having fun, or trudging along.

i also learned that the internet and cpu in general is my krytonite in using time wisely... those years in jr high and high school were i was all goody-goody studying? bs... high school never prepared me for dealing with cable and high-speed internet. the good part is that is now over, and should i ever have to go back to college for grad school, i believe i'll have a much better plan of attack in studying better and stuff and not slacking. after all, life is one giant experiment... try stuff out, if it doesn't work, try something else out. just don't lose focus.

i believe the real, life-changing stuff for me though, lay in my junior year; God gave me a second chance near the end of fall quarter, and then it was in my winter quarter, that my eyes came across the humongous eBook i read during junior year that would change my mentality about how i viewed the Bible and my beliefs in christianity forever.

i don't want to go back through my entire journal and pick out stuff in detail that occurred during my college period right now... i'm kinda tired, and intend to take a quick nap before i bring a buncha stuff back to the bay area, then come back early tomorrow for graduation(mom's too afraid to drive herself)... maybe later.

i will say this though... nothing occurs on this earth with it being in some minute way a perfect step in God's eyes of his perfect plan. we may not see the fruits of our labor right now even when it appears all for naught, but i believe somewhere in the distant future when we are spiritually mature enough to take it, that we'll see and understand it.

til then, keep reading the word of God each day. preferably, the KJV.

and test and retest and think about each and every aspect of your life from all angles, so that you'll always arrive at the best conclusion.

i'm out(not my blogging, you silly, i'll keep posting). i'll see you CTCC boyz back after retreat, as i'm not going. when you come back, you'll finally have tayshaun's "asian arms of D" to contend with.

i think i've heard word that dallas and miami tend to be those cities which are just more bandwagon type ppl; if something's good, they get into it; check this out...

cbs4.com - Plenty Of Room On The Bandwagon For New Heat Fans

---

right now i'm just PRAYING i graduate and don't have to come back fall... as an undergraduate... i am HOPING i come back... but not as an undergrad.

Ben Wallace - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"Like other big men in the NBA, namely Shaquille O'Neal and Wilt Chamberlain, Wallace is a poor free throw shooter. In fact, he is the worst free throw shooter in NBA history out of any player with more than 1000 attempts. As of October 2005, his NBA career average is 42.0%. This ineptitude at the free throw line results in his sometimes becoming a target of the so-called 'Hack-a-Shaq' defense (A tactic that has drawn the ire of teammate Rasheed Wallace). The reason for this drawback is that his right wrist has some ligaments that were cut off due to a surgery that was needed because his hand had some carpal tunnel issues. This causes his hand to go 'dead' whenever he dunks, falls to the ground, or when he shoots a free throw, resulting in him being unable to make them on a consistent basis."

we finally know why he can't shoot free throws...

i can't believe the heat won...

i thought i knew the final score was that the heat would get game 3, in retrospect after glancing at the live feed of the game's scores, i really think the heat are in trouble.

dallas should have won game 3.

dwyane wade's offensive stats are just disgustingly sick.

game 4, not THREE, IMO, will be the game that decides the outcome of the nba finals.

i've noticed that it's ALWAYS too early to call a series even if the team w/home advantage gets the 1st two. securing your home court wins is always good, and then it'll put pressure on the opponent, but it's not bulletproof. case in point, detroit and spurs last year. so spurs won the 1st 2 by huge margins. and they won the series. but a LOT of people weren't thinking that way after the outcome of games 3 and 4.

it's probably a given that the heat will win game 3. i BELIEVE it. no way the crowd will allow another loss, and no way will the duo allow it. but if they don't absolutely trash the mavs in that win, and only win by a hair, miami's in trouble.

like i said, you'll need to see how mavs respond in game 4, after losing, to see whether they'll get this.

You are now about to witness the strength of Bob Saget

haha...

Incredible...

Nadal is clearly Federer's thorn in the side... this kid's incredible. i think the french open clearly favors fast, scrambling players, the type that nadal is. if you can outrun your opponent, you'll shine on the clay.

---

US soccer better live up to its expectations this year... they start tomorrow.

---

note: i have never seen shaq so agile compared to this year... it's been a LOOONG time since i've seen him this fast. i don't think he's a defensive liability at all this season.

another note: like shaq, you can improve your chances of getting a good post-up near the basket, not just by backing down before demanding the ball, but shifting from one side of the court, to the other. trust me. they said something like this on espn.com, and i wholeheartedly agree.

---

some Justice League Unlimited videos for you to enjoy; i love how DC comics likes mashing all their superheroes that they create together...

JLU - Epilogue

they never got around to putting a "final episode" on Batman Beyond(which i used to watch everytime it showed on channel 20); incidentally, the "final episode" comes during this JLU episode; you finally find out all the kinks about terry's past. very nice.

Once And Future Thing

this one's during the future... so apparently static shock and batman beyond make up part of the future JLU huh? nice... so where's gear?(static's sidekick)

aaaand, not to leave out x-men... this stuff's good...

one man's worth

oh schnap! someone save xavier!

beyond good and evil

cable, apocalypse, the whole sche-bang...

(i always tended to like DC and marvel comics more than japanese anime)

---

but for an extra surprise, these are the japanese introductions to x-men; notice the BIG contrast... much more like japanese animation... ie a buncha robots are coming at the x-men, not magneto... weird...

intro 1

intro 2

good ol american fox x-men intro

---

three more funny things i gotta post for your enjoyment before i sign off and study:

click 1

click 2

click 3

---

i'll post something deep after thursday afternoon; that's when all my finals end.

some people view life as a race... and the finish line is death.

in reality, it's probably not that simple.

i think a more accurate picture is that in that race, death is our competitor; and he's slowly catching up from behind, sealing our fate; we just decide on the speed which we run whether he can catch us now, or later...

and various checkpoints in the race are our own personal goals that we want to set before we die. there is no actual finish line; you finish when death catches you. some of us will die before we finish those goals; others will achieve them all in their young life, then just run until death catches them in their old age.

furthermore, as we are running, there are numerous forks in the road that constantly appear. we call these forks "decisions." some of us will choose good decisions, others will choose bad decisions. but no matter what happens, once we choose them, they are set in stone; we can't go back and change our decisions; death will catch us before we can do that.

managed to actually get in a few rounds against other asian people playing street fighter 2: hyper fighting. i keep saying "i would've won more matches against them if the forward(middle kick) button wasn't broken" but excuses, excuses.

specifically, i played against 2 asians, both used guile exclusively. i started with guile and played around for a bit. since i couldn't use crouching forward(probably guile's best poke), that annoyed the crap outta me. i had to use crouching short, which, as guile, DOES go pretty far, but doesn't go as far as his crouching forward. and i really would only use crouching short for other reasons. also doesn't do as much hitstun. still, the guile vs guile games were pretty close. he won most of them, but they were close matches. lotsa throws and counterthrows (hey, cmon now; it's guile). i think i knew more tricks than him(i was throwing sonic booms more due to b,f,b+punch trick, using "piano" method to increase my chances of getting reversals, and doing tick throws more), but couldn't really counterattack his stuff better. after the loses started just piling up, i said "screw guile; i can't play him if i can't use croching forward" and switched to ryu(ryu relies on crouching forward a lot too for his normals, but since he's more of a trapping character, you don't really need to use it), and got manhandled the 1st game.

but then, i stuck with ryu, and was able to go on a tear; i think i got like 3-4 wins in a row. ryu vs guile in hyper fighting, is stated by many to be a 6-4 match in ryu's favor. still a close, good match. because ryu's hurricane kick, while prone to flash kicks and guile's crouching fierce, is invincible on the 1st frame, and goes cleanly over guile's sonic boom every time. takes away a lot of guile's pressure tactics up-close because of that. ryu wants to push guile into midrange where his faster fireball and the fact that he doesn't need to charge it gives him a significant advantage; if guile tries to match ryu projectile for projectile, he will lose. guile wants to get in where he has better normals, his crouching forward can stuff ryu's fireball before it comes out, and if his sonic boom matches ryu's hadoken, he gets a free backfist. i played defensively, cause while that's boring, it was the smart thing to do with ryu against guile. although i could've went for crossups a bit more if i got up-close. i actually got a lot of psychic dps on both guile players, ie, i'd hit them with jab dragon punch just as they stuck out crouching short or forward.

muga staff really need to fix that forward button. it's pissing me off.

one thing i don't like about american sticks is that the stick is slightly textured near the top; it's fine in tekken and virtua fighter, because you play that game by tapping the joystick. but it's horrible in street fighter, since you HOLD the joystick more. i've got this blister on my left thumb on the side as a result.

YouTube - ????? Knife Skills

for nostalgia's sake...

am i bringing back memories, college ctcc guys?

personally, all i could do was flip out, twirl, flip back. then again, that's all we could do.

if i tried what the girl did in the video at the same speed, i'd probably slash open all 5 digits on my left hand. and then, by the time i'd get it down, there'd be a puddle of blood forming near my legs.

DevilDucky - Richard Attenborough: The Lyrebird

this... bird... is... so... frikkin... awesome...

FUNNY POLICE VIDEO - CRACK DEALER JACKASS AT 60MPH - Google Video

What Ibid means

I get it now...

cause sometimes reading "Gipp's An Understanding History of the Bible" I would see this as a book quote in the footnotes, and it would be a really good quote, and so i was like, "man, all these quotes taken from this Ibid book; i gotta have this."

duuuuurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

for some strange reason, as of late regarding my current flavor in fighting games, i keep returning to street fighter 2: hyper fighting and super street fighter 2 turbo.

virtua fighter's a constant; vf5, vf4:final tuned or vf4:evolution i never put on the backburner.

but strangely, i've begun to disregard tekken more for sf2:hf and ssf2t.

perhaps it's cause i'm downloading a LOT more sf2 match videos, but i find the usage of moves in each match and the care and approach needed to win in those games very respectable. you never use just a few moves.

sf2 has such highly counter-character matchups and do really high damage at times that it's never about the combos. this game is about establishing your footsie game better than your opponent and slowly grinding them to a pulp.

i've always liked ryu, but i've gravitating more and more towards guile, because he can be played very aggressively. and i'm thinking of learning chun-li.

too bad nobody plays this. much like vf4. that and the fact that the "forward kick" button at the muga is broken.

one of the most interesting phenomenons regarding human nature towards sports is the act of rooting for your personal most hated team to lose. or rather, when watching a sports game, that you're rooting for the team you hate MORE to lose. or rooting for the team that just knocked your team out of the playoffs to lose. instead of rooting for the team you like more to win.

well, i'm here to tell you, STOPPIT.

to be quite frank, it's childish.

why?

no longer do you care about the enjoyment of the game.

you're exhibiting the desire that "if i can't have my team get a championship, neither will you."

and quite frankly, this desire is satanic in nature.

ever since Satan fell from heaven, he has sought to replace God. he also has genuinely sought that if he can't stay in heaven and must suffer, all other humans(who i guess he believes are even less righteous than he was, and even less of a creature than he was) must suffer too.

starting to see why i dislike this attitude so much?

i mean, i could be taking this a bit too far, but i don't believe that.

i'm not saying you have to like the team that just sent your team into the offseason.

or your most hated team.

but grow up already... if you really don't notice, this attitude detracts from your enjoyment of the game, b/c it's no longer about a good play or good sportsmanship... it's simply about the end score and whether the team you hate looks terrible.

so you're asking, what's the difference between rooting for the team you want to win vs rooting against the team you want to lose?

your attitude. whether you view plays as awesome b/c the player on your favored team is that talented, or whether you view plays as awesome b/c the player on your hated team looked like a klutz. etc.

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the other interesting phenomenon i guess i would say about sports is when your favorite team gets knocked out, ppl who write about it in online journals completely stop talking about the sport in its entirity. haha. but not me i guess.

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anyways, while i don't exactly like having the heat as the eastern reps as opposed to the pistons, i've kinda gotten over it. to the heat's credit, they've managed to find their offensive stroke, and i think their defense is for real. still don't like the fact that they had to get walker and williams(as both aren't good defenders), but i guess those are just personal pet peeves. that, and riley's brilliant coaching has more-or-less made them a team to beat. plus, i do like dwade and mourning. on the flip side, avery johnson has continued to show just how great of a coach he is. and dallas has continued to show how it is the deepest team in the league right now, plus, i love how dirk's evolving into an all-around player(i've felt this season that dirk had the potential to become the best center offensively if he could master some post-ups, and he's shown it). i also like josh howard.

i do like the matchup of mavericks vs heat. the mavericks smoked the heat in the regular season, but the heat have become that much better now. of course, i'll be hoping the mavericks win, but i'm not going to be that enbittered if the heat win. after all, dwade and mourning are really great.

if i was coaching the mavs, i have a lot of versatility as to how i want to take the heat apart, offensively. i could either put dirk at the 3 pt line since he is so hard to guard, and hopefully draw shaq and mourning out to the 3 pt line. that would free up the middle for terry, harris and howard to slash and do their thing. or, i give the ball to dirk in post and hope he draws fouls with shaq, or if doubled, kicks out to a plethora of 3-pt spot-up shooters. i personally like the 1st more.

heat of course, rely mainly upon their superstars. dallas has improved defensively, but they're not a lockdown defensive team yet. give the ball to shaq and wade, let them create by getting into the middle and then pass. then again, this is the heat's offensive gameplan every game lol.

if mav's improved defense holds up and they don't lose focus(they're prone to mental lapses in some games), i predict that the mavs will win in 6(they'll get all home games, grab the 5th game after they lose focus for 2 games and avery suddenly gets on them, then come home and win it). if not, heat in 6(heat will grab the 1st game showing they are for real, lose the 2nd game at home when avery gets on them, win the remainder)

if mavs win, mvp will be dirk(he will be highly responsible for getting shaq and 'zo to the 3 pt line). if heat win, mvp will be dwyane wade(mavs have slightly better big defenders than perimeter defenders; however, dwyane has not found any real counterdefender to him in the postseason).

interesting

to be honest, i kinda thought about it too... but never really said it outloud.

i do agree though, that game 6 will more-or-less decide what type of a coach flip is.

you have to realize though, that flip is a laid-back coach. while being laid-back has its benefits, ultimately, i'll take a strict coach over a laid-back coach.

phil jackson's the only exception.

"Harris went missing in action early in the second half. After diving over the Phoenix bench to save a loose ball, the Suns didn't make room for him to return, forcing him to walk all the way to the Dallas bench to find an opening."

That's low man...

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We are all Nowitznesses now...

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For those of you who were the same generation as I was and maybe older, I hope you enjoy this throwback cartoon

I grew up watching mainly TMNT.

To be honest though, in fair analyzation, the cartoons back then weren't necessarily better; all of us old people keep saying that's the truth, but that's only because we were raised on it, not because the young kids these days are idiots. Ppl really need to wise up; if we were raised on new TMNT, we'd swear up and down that the old TMNT looks like crap. I've seen both versions of TMNT, and i can see redeeming qualities of the new TMNT on FOX that makes it in some ways better than the old. Fight scenes are a little better(as opposed to the old where they just run into people basically and fall down), the turtles look a bit buffer, not like the skinny ass things in the old cartoon and their lines aren't as cheesy(although, this IS TMNT; lines are supposed to be cheesy). The redeeming qualities of the old TMNT though is that the storylines and plot are a lot better. I think.

Like I said, don't ever say what you watched back then is miles better than what is shown today. Sometimes I look up various episodes of shows back then I mightve watched, and then I go, "I watched THAT?!?!?!??"

(Although I will admit yu-gi-oh and pokemon is a BIT out there... that's my main pet peeve with today's cartoons)

ykno, playoff-wise, the pistons are looking a lot like the suns of the east in a lotta ways. ie the balance and depth, and arguably the defense at times is thrown out the window.

and what's surprising me is how the offense this year in the playoffs has almost single-handedly been carried by tayshaun alone.

bad, b/c they really need rasheed, billups, and rip to really beat everybody. i'm really surprised billups is not outstanding outside of the assists and free throws this year.

but at the same time, b/c tayshaun is my favorite piston right next to ben, it's really something to watch this guy. his gamestyle doesn't really stand out like other superstar players like dwade slashing all the time, but it's like you watch the game, he's playing solidly, not really exerting himself or demanding the ball, and then after a few minutes go by you're like "wow, he scored how many points?"

(btw, anybody else notice that tayshaun played with a red wristband on his left elbow for a FEW minutes during the 4th yesterday, then take it off again? weird... tayshaun plays with none of the sweatgear stuff or rubber bands)

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and yes, i'm still in shock ben wallace blocked shaq's dunk, and put him to the floor. notice how every miami heat fan on youtube.com commented "that was so a foul." hey, i may be a pistons fan, but i know a good block when i see one.

and yes, it's on my cpu right now. man, it's so fun to watch pistons block shots.

disgusting... i want to find a video of this on the web RIGHT NOW... i saw it during the replay after the game on espn.com and was totally blown away. it's stuff like this that made me like ben wallace so much.

"Prince had a steal and a dunk, then on the ensuing possession Ben Wallace brought the crowd to its feet.

Just when O'Neal was about to throw down another one of his backboard-shaking dunks, the 6-foot-7 Wallace leaped and stunted O'Neal's slam -- forcing a jump ball, and putting the 7-1 O'Neal on his back.

About a minute later, Wallace's three-point play -- yes, he made the free throw -- gave the Pistons a 60-53 lead."

he did it one-handed... against shaq going two-handed... dis... gus... ting...

alpha collection for ps2 comes out on june 11. 29.99. contains all versions of street fighter alpha, includes street fighter zero 2 alpha(can play as cammy, evil ryu, sunburnt sakura and various sf2 versions of characters), a special customizable version of sfa3(adds guile, evil ryu, fei long, t hawk and dee jay as well as a ton of customizable options), but most importantly, including an actual arcade-perfect sfa3. all previous versions of sfa3 were not arcade perfect, which meant unless you broke the law by dling emulators and roms or bought an actual arcade cab, you couldn't practice for any tournaments at home. now it's possible.

using charge characters, you can speed up the time you can fire off specials by doing precharged specials. in example, using guile, his sonic boom is b 2 seconds, f+p. now, do it as b 2 seconds, f~b~p or f~db~p. get it? this even works on the ssf2t, which is how daigo made his balrog look so scary against john choi in evo 2k4(i have the match video on my cpu).

i don't play mvc2 or really watch it anymore, but i still enjoy videos of duc do playing. nobody else uses spiral quite like he does. no one even USES anybody as a main outside of the top 4. but he does. and it's crazy.

ssf2t does not enable you to do "rapid-tap specials" like chun's lightning legs by the piano motion(short~forward~roundhouse~short~roundhouse); in fact, of all the sf games that are still played, only cvs2 allows you to do this. you need to press the same button quickly(in 3rd strike, you press the same button 4x before 2 seconds are up). however, you can double-tap twice on a button 2x, and that should do it. like use your index and middle finger to drum on forward 2x. unfortunately, it's quite difficult to do any rapid-tap specials without needing to buffer it first. chun-li could be so much higher if you could do it right straight out.

spd(spinning pile driver) does not require a full 360 motion. it only requires a 270. this is actually common knowledge. in fact, debatably you only need a 5/8th of a circle(so rotate from forward to up-back), but i believe the shortest way to do a 720 super is to do a 360+180, and since supers in capcom games are usually "double-pumps" of a special, i'm guessing you need to do a 270 as a regular 360. i'm still in amazement of those who can pull off "standing 270" in ssf2t, so maybe you do need to do a 5/8, not 6/8(270).

if i don't get a ps2-to-usb adapter that actually works with the joystick i got, i will have wasted 20 dollars for plunking down something for approx 1 year. i plan to EVENTUALLY get a ps2 so that i don't waste the money i used to get vf4evo and ttt, but i dunno how long til. i still WOULD like to play with a joystick on my cpu, so that i can actually practice for st and a3, since both are still played at sunnyvale golfland.

i really don't know whether to say the pistons are the model for the nba anymore... they might even be the ANTIMODEL of the league.

ok, yeah, they have the best starting 5 in the nba. that's an organizational success on joe dumars' part.

but as of late, the way they approach games is very kobe-shaq laker-ish...

-act like they can just turn it on when it matters(i think they blur the line between confidence and cockiness way too often; i don't see the sense of urgency at all until they're muddled deep)
-rely more upon their offense than their defense to win
-maybe try to rely too much upon getting calls?
-i want to say this is part of flip's doing, but i think flip knew what the pistons needed to work on, and so strayed away from the 1-on-1 lockdown D THINKING that the players would always know how to play it. it's probably both sides' fault; flip for not emphasizing it and urgency, and the players for not doing it.

even if they win tonight, will they carry that same sense of urgency into miami? or that sense of cockiness?

that said, even if the pistons get knocked out, they'll come back the next year. i expect it. and san antonio too. they just need a reality check.

that being said, maybe it IS good that the pistons get knocked out; i really need to finish the rest of this quarter strong.

YouTube - Senior Mutant Ninja Turtles

tha-rooooowww-back...

well, not really...