You've only begun to shine

I know, two posts in a month? I'm as shocked as you are.

First I must start off by mentioning a completely evil but wonderful game that has entered my life, Audiosurf (http://www.audio-surf.com). This game takes a song you pick, generates a track that bends, climbs, twists, and dives all based on the soft and intense moments of that song. That's pretty cool as it is, but then they added a sort of bejeweled type game with it where you match colored blocks. And to top that off, there are many types of 'cars' each playing the game a different way. Its great for a casual game where you want to listen to your music, and its good for those more intense people too at the harder difficulty levels.

So why did I say evil?

Well, after my first 'ride' through the game to a Genesis song, I saw my score. It then showed me the scores of everyone else who had played this song. The software doesn't use randomness, so for a song, you'll have the same generated track as everyone else. That person had a higher score than me, on a Genesis song. This could not be. So I went back in there and crushed him.

That's not evil, that's just mildly addicting (and a bit of pride as well).

What's evil is 2 days later I got an email stating that someone had beaten on of my scores.

That's just evil.

So if you do pick this game up ($10 on steam and comes with the Orange Box soundtrack), keep an eye out on the scoreboard for Genesis songs. The name at the top of the list should be Darkthorn. That's me. Pick your favorite band and dominate!

I'm not going to go into why my gaming screen name is Darkthorn, that's for a different post hopefully I won't be writing for a while.

That'll make sense eventually, trust me.

Gavin is progressing in his potty training. We're putting him in underwear, and he's doing pretty well. He's much better after 11am than he is before that. For him its not a matter of knowing, its just if he's busy, he doesn't care if he goes potty in his pants. Focus is a good thing I guess, but I'd like him to get this down before the baby comes.

Speaking of the baby, its my turn to pick the first name. So I'm digging through tons of Scottish names right now. I've got a couple I like, but none I've settled on. For the middle name I'm leaning towards Raguel. Look it up, and learn something. I know I give M crap for picking Gabriel for his son, but Raguel is more complementary to Gavin's middle name Raphael. Again, look it up, knowledge is good for you.

Don't ask me why an agnostic like myself is picking angel names for his kid's middle names. It is just one of those things OK?

On the reading front, I finished Stephen Colbert's I Am America (and so can you!), which I found amusing. I'm now working on Terry Goodkind's final book in his series. I have to admire this guy, he's managed to write an 11 book series that well paces the overarching storyline, while giving detailed individual subplots. He writes great characters, and does a fantastic job of keeping you on your toes. Its not a perfect series, but I highly recommend it. Warning the first book will shock your sensibilities about 2/3 of the way in, push through it and you will be rewarded. He decided to end this series with a sub-trilogy, that started very very slowly, but once it got moving its hard to stop turning the pages.

On the music front....Anna, Anna, Anna.....This is very disappointing. Those of you who actually remember what I post remember that I highly regarded Anna Nalick's first album "Wreck Of The Day". That came out in 2005, then re-released with more tracks in 2006. You might also remember my post about prolific album releasing vs non, and my worries about what the record companies would do this this artist since it had been about 3 years. Well, apparently after 3 years all that's coming out is an EP with 2 new songs, and 3 old songs acoustic versions.

Now I have nothing against EPs, Charlotte Martin has shown what good outlets they can be. But after 3 years I would hope there'd be something more. Anna's mentioned a new album in a couple of her posts (though she seems unsure when it will be released herself), so I assume the material is there. Her new song "Shine" is quite good, so she's not out of talent (I hope). So what's the deal? I know this isn't a huge deal to people, I just hate what seems to be stifling of good talent by the record company. I could be wrong, but after seeing what has happened to Vanessa Carlton, Sophie B. Hawkins, and others I doubt it.

So this post wasn't as deep as the last one, I never said I would be consistent.