I’ll post about my Chicago trip a bit later, as I want to devote a bit more time to it than I really have right now. Heh. Anyway…

Yes, it’s my birthday. I don’t really feel too much older… and I definitely don’t feel like I’m 33 years old. Can’t deny the truth, though… oh, well. On the bright side, at least I’m still carded for liquor. :-)

I have to admit, my trip to Chicago and getting to visit the Midway Games studios was a big present to myself. I’ve been playing Midway-created or licensed games as far back as 1979 when I was a huge fan of Space Invaders (originally created by Taito but released in the States by Midway), so it was really a big treat for me to be able to walk around the studios and see where the games were made. I’ll go into more detail in the Chicago trip post, but all in all I REALLY enjoyed my trip out there.

Anyway, this morning, I got up, and opened my presents from my Mom and Dad. I got Matrix Revolutions, Batman Begins, and V for Vendetta on DVD, and a Logitech Harmony Advanced Universal Remote for Xbox 360. (Before you ask, I’m actually ordering an Xbox 360 later today.) In addition, they got me Midway Arcade Treasures 3 and Blitz: The League for Xbox. Unfortunately, both of those will need to be exchanged. :-/ While I was in Chicago I had picked up a copy of Midway Arcade Treasures 3 for GameCube (forgetting it was on my birthday list), and Blitz: The League isn’t backwards-compatible yet. They’ll get me the 360 version of Blitz: The League, and something else in place of MAT3.

All in all, it’s been a good birthday so far. :-) I’m thankful for everything I’ve gotten, and it’s more or less been a nice and quiet day. Hopefully it just continues like this…

Ah, well. For now, though, I need to get back to work…

Well, I suppose I should apologize for the size of the pic of Henry in the previous post. That post (and this post, for that matter) was posted via email using a WordPress plugin called Postie, and I had forgotten to configure it to resize attached images. Ah, well…

Right now I’m at Baker St. Pub, having a Shiner and waiting on the dinner we ordered. We actually went out to Sam’s to see if they had a leather blazer in my size. My old blazer had been ripped badly in an accident last year, and I wanted to replace it. Unfortunately, neither Sam’s nor Costco had them in. Ah, well… There’s always other stores.

Last night was pretty fun; like the previous post said, I went to a “hillbilly Haloween” party Becky and Brian were throwing. Although, it was depressing how easy it was to make my costume. I wore blue jeans, a white undershirt, and a baseball cap Dad let me borrow. Then, as a bit of inspiration, I removed the sleeves from my blue denim jacket (which were attached via zippers), and wore that too. At the end of the night, I had to also feel depressed about the fact that despite our costumes and joking, reality was likely worse. It also felt weird being the only single one there, other than Henry. Still, it was a lot of fun, and it was great being able to see everyone again.

Anyway, looks like the food’s coming, so I’ll wrap this up now. More later, perhaps…

I’ll have a full post about this later, but for now… Here’s proof my friend Henry has no shame…..

http://wired.com/wired/archive/14.11/sixwords.html

We’ll be brief: Hemingway once wrote a story in just six words (“For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”) and is said to have called it his best work. So we asked sci-fi, fantasy, and horror writers from the realms of books, TV, movies, and games to take a shot themselves.

Dozens of our favorite auteurs put their words to paper, and five master graphic designers took them to the drawing board. Sure, Arthur C. Clarke refused to trim his (“God said, ‘Cancel Program GENESIS.’ The universe ceased to exist.”), but the rest are concise masterpieces.

I have to admit, several of them made me laugh out loud, including Alan Moore’s, Charles Stross’s, and Steven Meretzky’s. Give them a read… they’re rather amusing and quite well done. :-)

Well, like the subject line says, I can’t say it was an entirely productive weekend. I got some stuff done, but not anything of real note. For example, my biggest accomplishment yesterday was getting my car cleaned out. My toll road tag needed replacing, so while I did that I cleaned a bunch of garbage out of my car’s backseat, glove compartment, and armrest area. Unfortunately, I’ve not quite disposed of it yet; it’s sitting in a box on my bed right now, but before I head on to bed tonight I’ll get it taken care of. Now my car can actually carry four people… though, truth be told, the fact that I drive a coupe means that the two in back would get awfully squished, even if there is a third door on the passenger side for the back seat.

I also upgraded my online gallery to the latest version of the Gallery software, as a recent PHP upgrade on this server had futzed up some of the formatting. I’ve noticed that for some reason my gallery is showing up on image searches for Mortal Kombat: Armageddon; it’s kind of amusing, really, considering the fact that the only Mortal Kombat pics I have are in my E3 galleries.

I also FINALLY got around to watching Constantine last night. My verdict? It’s not very faithful to the source material (if it was, Sean Bean would be playing John Constantine and not Keanu Reeves), but for what it was I rather enjoyed it. It might even find a place on my DVD shelf at some point. In addition, I managed to catch the first episode of Torchwood tonight; for those who don’t know, Torchwood is a somewhat more mature spinoff of Doctor Who. My verdict? I’m definitely sticking around for this one. It’s certainly strong enough to stand on its own, with only a couple of passing references to the original series.

Anyway… time for me to get some of this garbage from my car sorted out. Fun fun…

Yep, Fight Night got announced last night.

For those people who don’t know, Fight Night is the celebrity chat event Mortal Kombat Online has been holding about once a year or so. This time we’ll have the development team for Mortal Kombat: Armageddon on hand. It’s usually a rather hectic and trying time for me, as trying to arrange a chat with something like 800-1000 guests is never a fun time. I’ll have to get the server operators to help out again, plus make sure ye olde MKBot is ready this time. I think I’m ready for it, but it’s never an easy time. It doesn’t help that I can’t take my two-week sabbatical after Fight Night this year, seeing as I’m now the main guy in charge.

Speaking of which… I officially took the title of Webmaster for the site yesterday, and had to remove Scott Howell’s name from the Community FAQ and Staff pages. I’m still kind of overwhelmed about taking his place as webmaster. I just hope I can cut it as well as he did in his time here. Oh, well… we’ll see what happens.

Oh, and as for the art above? That was the work of The-Switcher. Damn nice work, I must say… :-)

This came up in an IM conversation between myself and Lhadatt last night…

(Note to you non-Texans: this is during last night’s gubernatorial debate. “Kinky” refers to Kinky Friedman, one of two independents running for governor of Texas.)

Lhadatt: the difference between kinky and the other 3 candidates is amusing.
DArqBishop: ?
Lhadatt: half-watching the debate.
Lhadatt: someone asked kinky about his “racist” comments.
Lhadatt: kinky: keep getting offended and you’ll never get anything accomplished
Lhadatt: other 3: offensive language has no place in politics
DArqBishop: I dunno.
DArqBishop: I consider “warrantless wiretapping”, “retroactive immunity for war crimes”, and “legal torture” to be offensive language yet they seem to have no problem with it in politics.
Lhadatt: hahaha

All right, so, for those who might not have been keeping up with current events over at Mortal Kombat Online, Scott Howell, one of the two co-founders and the site webmaster, resigned yesterday. While it’s going to be sad to see him go, it’s something that had been brewing for a while, and we had prepared for this moment. So, while he’s not going to be working for the site any longer, we will still keep going, as strongly as we have been.

Of course, now this means I’m taking his place as webmaster. Eeeeep.

On one hand, I’ve been ready for this moment for a while, and have been doing a lot of hard work for the site. On the other hand, having more of the responsibility for the site on my shoulder is a hellishly daunting task. I just hope I can live up to what Scott brought to the site for so long.

Here’s hoping, anyway.

Clarke’s First Law

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Bishop’s Corollary to Clarke’s First Law

Any sufficiently advanced explanation is indistinguishable from bullshit.

Bishop’s Law of Houston Restaurants

If you eat at a sit-down Houston restaurant and the waiter tells you about the day’s specials, one of them will involve mahi-mahi.