The Gods looked down from the heavens and cast their eyes upon Daemon and noticed his dilemma. His life situation makes it very difficult to travel and he obviously is a very devoted fan of Sumo -- what to do? Sure there's always Cthulhu and the many favors he owes Daemon, but Cthulhu's constant tete-a-tete's with Lord Hastur over who rules the unseen army of trilobites lurking in the deepest, darkest areas of the world's oceans makes his word somewhat suspect and riddled with dangerous contractual ensnarements. No, it's best to let him stew in his dreaming city. Yes...let him wait. Hmmmm, where were we? Ah yes! One quick call to Odin and prithee thee gaze upon his generous gift!

Whoops! Wait a tic. I sense Odin's grim and heavy mien at work here in the form of a test. Most likely he has enlisted that trickster Loki to aid him in an atypical Norse Gods slight of hand. Luckily I am a demi-god of average intelligence and not nearly the dullard that Loki's half brother Thor is and thus I can not be tricked into standing here all day. Methinks it is time for us to gather ourselves and get thee hence from this locale. Onward!

Excellent! Excellent! *steeples hands ominously* I have managed to procure tickets to the exhibition Los Angeles Sumo tournament to be held at L.A. Memorial Arena on June 7th! Being a somewhat frugal immortal (as well as having friends who aren't quite THAT big on watching the magnificent spectacle of Ozumo) I have decided to buy the S-type tickets which are the first seats behind the floor mats in front of the dohyo (sumo ring)!

All Norse activity aside, I'm incredibly happy to finally get to see Sumo live and in person! I'll get to yell out words of encouragement to my favorites and hopefully I'll get to meet some of them and get some keen pictures! Regardless I'm going bonkers with anticipation and I only hope they have all sorts of crazy memorabilia marking the occasion. Even if they don't, this could be my once in a lifetime moment to cheer them on live and boy oh boy am I excited for this!

Actually it's not that odd for them to travel here for special trips. A few years ago they visited Las Vegas but...well I don't go to Las Vegas as I despise that town and since it was in Vegas it was insanely expensive just to get in much less find a hotel to stay at. One point of interest though is the Yokozuna Asashoryu (pictured) and his mawashi (the belt that the rikishi wear).

Several years ago he attempted to change the color of his mawashi from black to the gold one you see in the picture. He quickly changed it back when he suffered a loss in it (sumo are a very superstitious lot) and went back to black for good. But I noticed that whenever they have an overseas exhibition match he often puts the gold mawashi back on because it's flashy I suppose and there's a considerable lack of pressure in a tournament that's mainly just for fun. That would be coolness indeed if the gold makes an appearance on the sacred dohyo!

*does a happy dance*

*injures knee again*

Bam! Like a bullet to the head there it was! The grim forces of inevitability had obeyed their very nature and I found myself the not entirely unwilling victim of their unavoidable attack! When the haze began to clear at long last I could see the steady hand of the fates focused upon me. Those hands belonged to Gamespot users, and all around bon vivants, Mac906 and Samwel_X. Ladies and gentlemen it would appear that I have been "tagged" as the kids say in their vernacular. A Double Tag! Oh goodness...and me with nothing but my jim jams on. Well...let's tackle this quickly and perhaps the snacks will last us during the short, and entirely unannouced, visit.

#1 JSR

Jet Set Radiooooooo! Yes indeed one of my all time favorite video games and one of the big reasons why the Dreamcast will always hold a special place in my heart. But, did you know that Daemon holds the highest score ever attained in Jet Set Radio? It's true! Well...I like to think it's true anyways. I did used to post my high scores off and on during the heyday of the Dreamcast and nobody ever had a higher score so I'm just going to settle with the idea that I have the highest one and leave it at that.

I know it's possible to beat my score but, unless there's some weird glitchy thing I never came across, you could only beat it by small increments and you'd have to tell me how you did it otherwise I'd have to assume that you're just trying to be E-tough. I'm being honest about this, there's a particular level in which enables you to do a particular trick that you can't do on any other level so instead of the +100,000 scores you can obtain a +200,000. S'true!

#2 Cutting

Oh dear it would appear we've hit a bit of a dark patch. You see, Daemon actually has no sense of self-worth and assigns almost no value to his very life and some years ago he used to cut himself. He cut himself quite a lot and so boldly that looking back you would've thought that people other than his close friends would have actual noticed. But they never did, or perhaps, they just didn't want to. Why should they really?

That's all in the past however and although the thoughts and temptations still come to mind during particularly stressful periods, I seem to have moved far enough way and gathered enough steam and forward momentum in the form of friends, work and numerous hobbies, that the threats against myself no longer seem to be carried out. It might be the unique way in which I eventurally dealt with the razor issue that holds me back, or perhaps its just a small semblance of maturity settling in at long last.

And now for something completely different...

#3 Barbie!

Now here's another awkward segue...

#4 Wrestling!

Wrestling? Some friends of mine here may, or may not know that I actually enjoy watching professional wrestling and not just sumo wrestling which I actually watched long prior to my exposure to pro wrestling. What you may not know is that since I was old enough to form an opinion I absolutely hated wrestling with a passion. I bad-mouthed it on a constant basis and probably stated all those responses you always see if anybody were to bring the subject up on a public board. In fact, I didn't catch the wrestling bug until 1998 when I turned 34!

Until that year I just parroted all the usual childish inanities such as "stupid", "childish", "immature", "idiotic", and that ultimate neon sign of wrestling ignorance, "fake". Yes indeed it was fake. That's what everyone says right? They're just "acting". They're just "pretending". It's not real! Don't they get it? It's FAKE!

Wrong. I was dead wrong.

In '98 I caught a documentary on Bret Hart and my eyes were opened to what the world of professional wrestling really was. I had always just seen the character sound bites that every else sees. The character yelling at another character. "Grrrr! I'm a going to kill youuuuuuu!" But then I saw the constant pain, the dedication, the long, long hours put into making a perfect match for the audience for what was often very little pay. I started watching more and started looking past the big cartoon characters and I started watching the technical wrestlers and I was amazed at what I saw.

Then it happened! My friends took me to a local PWG show in Los Angeles. It was one of the most crazy fun times I've ever had in my life! I continued going for most of the shows that year and my oh my did I have a great time! We would arrive early so we could sit on the front seats and the action was so fast and furious that we had to dive for cover often as the wrestlers would often come flying over the ropes only to devastate our chairs. I cheered! I booed! I argued with the bad guys while I handed the good guys a bottle of life giving water and sometimes warned them of an impending attack "look out Human Tornado!".

The only downside is watching consumate professionals live on a regular basis sure makes the TV stuff hard to get into. But why would a movie and music snob get into big guys smacking each other around and yelling? Isn't it still fake...ish? Because good professional wrestling for me is highly technical live action stunt choreography with a lot of pain and endurance put to the test on an almost nightly basis. Stating that it's fake is as meaningless as informing me that Harrison Ford's character in Indiana Jones "isn't real". Yeah it's "fake" in the sense of being planned out. But the dedication and pain are real and it's a damn fine show isn't it?

One more thing. Remember those friends of mine that absolutely insisted that I attend live wrestling shows? Well one speaks 7 languages fluently and knows pretty much anything you'd want to know about asian and religious history off the top of his head, and the other is a natty, prim and proper professor of English. So...yeah, fans aren't always crazy teens who have trouble spelling.

At long last the last factoid!

#5 Vegetables!

I really, really, REALLY, dislike vegetables. :evil:

Okay, okay! I do like corn and green beans but that's it!

Who I tag: Freakyzeeky1986, Telvisnostic, Hungry_bunny, ShuLordLiuPei, & Hallenbeck77!

It appears that I'm going to have to try to work in my visits to the local China town part of L.A. a bit more often as this year there appear to be an veritable avalanche of very promising asian films both epic and cult, for 2008. Here's a handful of films that I would like to steer your collective attentions towards in the hopes that they either excite or puzzle you -- possibly both.

First up is the martial arts film Chocolate. Chocolate is the story of an autistic girl who has unnatural reflexes and senses and the uncanny ability to physically mimic anything that she sees. She teaches herself a massive amount of martial arts by watching endless martial art films as well as the members of the Muay Thai kickboxing school next door. Her mother becomes gravely ill and our main character finds a list of old debtors in her mother belongings. She decides to go out collecting which eventually leads her to confrontations with local gangs as well as the Yakuza, an organization to which her father belongs.

Chocolate is directed by Prachya Pinkaew who you may know as the director behind Ong Bak and Tom Yum Goong (AKA The Protector). The films stars newcomer Nicharee "Jeeja" Vismistananda who has been studying with Tony Jaa's mentor and fight choreographer Panna Rittikrai for many years in preparation for this role so the fighting should be solid. Although I am a big fan of Ong Bak, I was very disappointed by his follow up film The Protector so I still have some small reservations. Nevertheless, the trailer has sold me and I will give it a shot and see what happens.

Chocolate Trailer.

Official site.

Next up is the quite possibly insane movie Sukiyaki Western Django! This is the newest film from the uneven genius that is Takashi Miike (Ichi the Killer, Audition, and...honestly folks, he's constantly making films so just put his name in Google and stand back) and is his strange and wonderful homage to the spaghetti western genre.

"The plot: Two clans, Genji, the white clan led by Heike, the red clan led by Kiyomori, battle for a legendary treasure hidden in a desolate mountain town. One day, a lone gunman, burdened with deep emotional scars but blessed with incredible shooting skills, drifts into town. Two clans try to woo the lone gunman to their sides, but he has ulterior motives. Dirty tricks, betrayal, desire and love collide as the situation erupts into a final, explosive showdown "

Now with Miike you never are really sure what you're going to get as he likes to constantly dabble in all sorts of film techniques and narratives. But from what I've heard it's a flashy fast-paced movie with not really a lot of time devoted to intensive character introspectives. This would place it in the "just enjoy the ride and the neo-western get ups and especially the gang member in the lower right with the puppy-eared hat on (really...check that out)" kind of film. There's also an extended guest appearance from Quentin Tarantino in the film as well which I believe is all in the first part of the film but don't hold me to that. It's a Miike film so by all means go out and see it!

Oh I'm sorry! I did forget to mention one critical aspect of the film. In this particular film Miike decided that EVERYONE should do their lines in English no matter how poor their English is and no matter how heavy their accent is.:| I know what? It just goes to show you this is going to be a hootenanny of a film! A horrible misguided trainwreck of an homage or a perfectly crafted cult film? You decide!

Sukiyaki Western Django Trailer.

Official Website.

Hold on to your hats (if indeed Miike's film ideas have not somehow toppled them) it's giant epic movie time! An all new incredibly expensive adaptation of the legendary novel "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" by Luo Guanzhong. I present to you, Three Kingdoms - Resurrection of the Dragon!

Obviously any Chinese history scholar or avid player of the Dynasty Warriors games are completely familar with the principle players and the overall plot. "But Daemon, you say to yourself in the inner-voice you use to represent me, that story comes in two volumes and is incredibly long! What part do they focus on?". Hmmmm...good question. Let's look at the plot summary.

"His country torn asunder by civil war, Zhao, a common man heeds the call of duty and from the humblest of roots rises through the ranks on wings of courage and cunning to command an army charged with liberating the land from an evil warlord. Inspiring by action, honor and a dream of unifying his divided nation, Zhao's heroism becomes legend, but as the years pass and the throne changes hands the war still rages on. When a newly enthroned king decides peace can only be achieved by defeating the warlords once and for all, the aging Zhao embarks on his final and greatest campaign, a road to adventure that will crown his name in glory for all time."

So it would appear they are concentrating on Zhao Lun's character who is played by the incredibly popular actor Andy Lau in this film. The film also stars Maggie Q, Vannesa Wu, and Sammo Hung!:o

Three Kingdoms - Resurrection of the Dragon Trailer.

Official Site.

What's this?! Why it's the newest film by legendary director John Woo! If you are indeed one of those aforementioned history scholars or DW veterans you might recognize the title denoting a struggle that took place...in the Three Kindoms era! That's right, it's another big epic film that takes place during that incredibly over-trampled historic era known as the Three Kingdoms.

Word on the street is that the production has had some issues most notably with the previously scheduled guest appearance of Chow-yun Fat. Fat bailed at the last second due to some other project he wanted to attend and when the word floated downstream that he could perhaps come back and film his part the word at Woo's camp was "Hmmmmmm....no". Honestly, don't mess with the Chinese when it comes to film. They don't care how big you are if they even think that you are belittling them they will cut you out of their life (which is why Jet Li wasn't in the Matrix sequels).

"The plot: In 208 A.D., in the final days of the Han Dynasty, shrewd Prime Minster Cao convinced the fickle Emperor Han the only way to unite all of China was to declare war on the kingdoms of Xu in the west and East Wu in the south. Thus began a military campaign of unprecedented scale, led by the Prime Minister, himself. Left with no other hope for survival, the kingdoms of Xu and East Wu formed an unlikely alliance. Numerous battles of strength and wit ensued, both on land and on water, eventually culminating in the battle of Red Cliff. During the battle, two thousand ships were burned, and the course of Chinese history was changed forever."

Ahhh finally some crazy Cao Cao (Ts'ao Ts'ao :evil: ) action. From what I've read the movie is sooooooo long that Woo is releasing it as a two parter all throughout parts of Asia but for the Western release it's going to be cut down and compacted into just one movie. Obviously this is disappointing news but hopefully the DVD release will include the full cut and if not, there's always the Chinese stores selling the original Asian release I suppose. Then again, there's always the chance that Woo has sorely over-extended his goal and is giving us a fat and bloated monster of a film. Regardless, it does look interesting and the sets and designs are amazing. Can John Woo deliver?

Red Cliff Trailer.

Trailer Transcript:

Trailer transcript:

"208 AD (The 13th year of Jianan, Han emperor Xian)
Cao Cao: Since I formed my army, I have vowed to destroy the warlords.
Chang Chen as Sun Quan.
Cao Cao commend his army and fleet with one million men... and launches the battle against Jingzhou (province) and Suppresses Sun Quan.
Lin Chi-Ling as the Younger Qiao.
Hu Jun as Zhao Zilong.
Ba Sen as Guan Yu.
Causing Sun Quan and Liu Bei to form a joint force, commanded by Zhou Yu. The war has begun...
The most famous battle... the most expensive production in Asia with the US$80 million... A strong cast a crew... in a scale never seen before...
Shido Nakamura as Gan Ning.
Red Cliff
Zhao Wei as Sun Shangxiang.
Takeshi Kaneshiro as Zhuge Liang.
Leung Chiu-Wai as Zhou Yu.
Zhang Fengyi as Cao Cao.
Cao Cao: We must win in Red Cliff and take Chaisang (City).
John Wo Film.
Red Cliff
This Summer - This July, shake the world."

Official Site (Japanese)

Obviously there's quite a few more asian films coming out that look promising but at the moment I am quite ill and it's a tad hard to concentrate and so I'm off to rest a bit more and dream my dreamy dreams of bikini clad woman fighting off zombies. If only they would make a film of the Oneechanbara (yay Japanese puns) game series. What?!

*bolts upright*

:o

From 24framespersecond site-

"Bikini clad cowgirl dispatching Zombies with Samurai swords!? It can mean only one thing, the teaser trailer for Yôhei Fukuda's Japanese B-horror Slash em up 'OneChanbara: The movie' has just arrive online.

Based on the popular video game series the pic tells the tale of two scantily clad heroines Aya (Eri Otoguro) and her sister Saki (Chise Nakamura), as they fight to save their home from Zombie attack with nothing more than Katanas, sawn off shotguns and an artfully draped feather Boa."

Official Website

:o

*faints*

It's time for another sumo tournament and it's surprising how fast a week has flown by. Of course a large part of that might be that I've been going insane at work preparing for my yearly inventory but that doesn't take away my inherent excitement for the sport of Ozumo. After a horrific year for the world of sumo last year, this year has been very exciting with the return of the Dai Yokozuna Asashoryu restoring order to a chaotic universe. I take that back -- he is in fact restoring chaos to a boring and lifeless universe but he's going about it in an orderly fashion. Understand? No?

To put it simply Asashoryu is one tough drill sergeant who will either destroy you or make you stronger. Without him the rikishi fall into complancency and the tournaments just grind along with the other Yokozuna Hakuho just tossing people limply aside while he ambles quietly into another victory. Now that Asashoryu is back, Hakuho has real competition and the young guns look forward to proving themselves! Let's go check on Daemon's favorites and other goings on!

Asashoryu is currently in 1st place with no losses. His ego is still a little out of control and his constant need to over dominate his opponents has, at times, put him in dangerous positions which could result in an embarassing and unnecessary loss. He has begun to calm down during the latter half of the tournament and is exhibiting more controlled and steady sumo so hopefully he will continue on this course. He has received some criticisms (as he always does) for being overly aggressive but that's what he does -- put the fear of God into his opponents.

You might be surprised to find out that contrary to what this photo might indicate Hakuho is actually having a good tournament with only one loss. This is not unusual for him as he has this nasty tendency to suffer a strange loss in the first week and then he goes on to finish the tournament with nothing but wins. The reason the Yokozuna is so angry and trying to stifle an all-encompassing urge to violently attack everyone around him is the way he lost.

The gentleman in the foreground is Aminishiki. He is Hakuho's right hand man and the rikishi who holds the sword for Hakuho during his Dohyo-iri (ring entering ceremony). Aminishiki defeated Hakuho by the technique known as a tachi-ai henka. Basically he jumped to the side when Hakuho charged him and slapped him down. Generally this is considered gutless sumo and is heavily looked down upon but it is not an illegal tactic. It is something that injured opponents do when they just need one more win to get a winning record. It is definitely not something you do to somebody you respect and it's incredibly rare that anybody would have the nerve to do it to a Yokozuna. I can't imagine what would happen if anybody tried that on Asashoryu.

There was a very scary moment a few days ago when Kakizoe crashed into Sakaizawa and hit him so hard that it knocked him clean out and he just collapsed on the ground and didn't move. I have seen many instances where a rikishi was hit really hard and basically TKO'd but he was still awake but just really groggy and out of it for a few seconds. Everyone just froze waiting for Sakaizawa to rouse but he didn't and Kakizoe immediately became very upset and concerned. Sakaizawa finally awoke and they wheel-chaired him away as his dead fall really ripped up his knee something fierce. It's always sad to see somebody suffer a possibly career ending injury in a split second of action.

Ama is having one of those off tournaments. Although an incredibly skilled technical wrestler, he seems to be settling into these regular tournaments where he seems to be over thinking everything and he ends up just violently jerking all over the place with no real plan in mind. He really needs to get this under control if he's to make a serious run for the title of Ozeki. When he's on he's one of the most exciting wrestlers to watch, but when he's off it's really hard to watch.

Speaking of which pretty much ALL the ozeki having been stinking it up this tournament which once again points out how badly we need new blood to replace these guys. A few of the veterans have decent enough excuses as they have been around longer than most wrestlers and several of them have won multiple tournaments. But an Ozeki's job is to challenge the Yokozuna's dominance and to get more than just enough to wins to not be demoted. Unfortunately they all seem to be constantly settling for just that -- just enough wins to not get demoted with no desire to go for the tournament. Embarassing.

Fan favorite Takamisakari (AKA Robocop) is having a great tournament at long last. After several tournaments that threatened to throw him into the minor leagues (and thus off the televised broadcast), he has finally snapped out of his doldrums and has already attained a winning record for this tournament! Typically Takamisakari has a good first week and then, just as he's about to get a winning tournament, he drops every single match for the remaining week. Not so this tournament! Takamisakari is a winner which means the fans are incredibly happy and all of Japan can breathe a sigh of relief that their cash cow will not be sent away.

Two rikishi that have impressed me are Kisenosato and newcomer Wakanoho. Both men consistantly show no fear towards any wrestler and take any punishment they receive in stride. It's always great to see Kisenosato attempt to stare down the Yokozuna and Ozeki veterans, but it was very thrilling to watch Wakanoho just stare deeply into the eyes of the dominant Yokozunas, the eyes of terror, and he would then flex his arms letting them know that he's going to bring everything he's got which really ticked them off. Thrilling stuff and there's still one more week to go!

My goodness how time flies when one is self-conscious of imminent failure! This is my odd way of stating that I really didn't mean for this much time to pass between blogs. As per usual my overactive appetite for creation got the better of me and I started to imagine these grandiose epic blogs that I would construct that would stand as a testament to mankind -- well, at least the mankind that makes up the reasonably vast tapestry that makes up the online world of Gamespot.

Then something happened. I hesistated. A simple mental blink and suddenly creativity began to unravel. Then one week passed. Then another. Another soon followed which, if you're paying attention, was quickly followed by a long string of the aforementioned "anothers". Soon time was having its merry way with me and it became disconnected from my core sense and the whole of idea of stepping back and looking at that big picture of life, like a good higher mammal, completely escaped me. Every day was a new day in which I fought to survive! If only I could get home to watch more 30's movies on the Turner Movie Channel! Must...LIVE!

So...I lost track of time and procrastinated. :| I know, I could have just said that but as people who frequent some of the areas in which I post, brevity is just not my strong suit. I also came across some very well written blogs that so impressed me with their content that I felt any contribution that I would put forth would just seem somewhat moot.

Where are are all these blocks of text going? Where's the atypical Daemon punch line? Personal growth epiphanies? A point perhaps? Sorry but no, there's nothing here. Just me hanging out at Gamespot. I'm just going to try to move forward and see if anybody wants to come along. If you don't, that's fine. So what's going on?

I finally got Xbox Live! For some of my newer Gamespot compatriots this may seem like an odd announcement I suppose. But I actually picked up a 360 just a few months after launch and I never bothered to get the XBL service! No particular reason. I just never thought playing online was anything all that special and after watching many a game get half-assed out the production door just because the company wanted to add online play made the idea of partaking in this service seemed even less appealing. But those thrice-damned online games, patches, updates, and added content at long last compelled me to take the plunge and goodness me but I went crazy soon afterwards.

I immediately bought Castlevania - Symphony of the Night! And...no wait, I lied to you for dramatic purposes. I actually first went online and started downloaded every appealing add-on packs that I could never get ahold of and was oh-so-jealous of my online enabled buddies for possessing --- then I bought SOTN. I apologize if I misled you. So, blah blah blah, greatest game ever, nothing even comes close, blah blah, like an old friend, blah blah...hey! I forgot you don't have a separate listing of all the monsters in this iteration so the only way to check on your monster progress is to go all the way back to the library.:| Every time!:x Other than that...perfection.

Pinball! :D Okay I'm sure some of you are wondering how I could possibly be so excited to play simple pinball games on XBL. Well as I've grown up, quite literally with the home gaming market, I've always longed for a pinball machine and I frequently looked forward to the many attempts to emulate the pinball experience. Yes I realize that I'm a big boy now and I have a computer and decent emulators have been around for a few years but I just won't buy games for my computer. You see, a little voice in my head informs me that if I buy games for my computer then I will soon never leave the house and ignore everything and everyone to appease its formidable skills at customization. So...no. No I won't buy any games for my computer. Yay pinball!

I GOT A CAR! It's a very old hand me down that's been, well, handed down many, many times in the past but it gets me back and forth to work and the store so I'm not going to knock it. I've actually been riding my bike to and from work for two years now so having anything at this point is just the greatest gift I could have received. Well, maybe not the greatest gift as I have a very active imagination but still -- pure awesomeness in the mental stress department and a great relief to my body overall. My best friend gave it to me actually and for his efforts I gave him my extra emergency "oh my god all the 360's will break" spare 360 that I've been holding onto for years because my xbox never has died. Someday it will I suppose. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next year, but isn't that true for all of us?

It's my date of birth once again and another year has come and gone and here I sit once again attempting to look back with any semblance of clarity as to the how and why of it all. I see I still have some metaphoric skeletons that need to be brought forth and dealt with lest the bones themselves gain life and begin to direct the movement of my life as well as affect the overall mental health of yours truly. Some elements of my quotidian existence have taken quite a downturn in quality, but even a silly, sad sapling such as myself has to admit that there has been some light flickering throughout the tunnel of my life. So without any further ado...on with the festivities!

It's been no secret that I don't get along with my family to any great degree and so it has been my childhood dream for quite a while that I was in fact adopted. My two younger sisters are both adopted so it's not out of thin air that I plucked this fantasy. But in the end you just have to face facts and realize that you need to get along with your family as best you can and recognize the funny similarities that you share.

I have a tendency to attract quite an odd array of friends with which to surround me so please attend with an open mind and understand that some of these folks are just as scared of you as you might be of them. That being said it's best if you steer clear of any of said partygoer's minions as they can tend to be a tad...biteyscratchy.

As many may know I have quite eclectic tastes in music and so I hired these guys sight unseen as they come highly recommended. I love old traditional music and I've heard that halfway through the set DJ Krush comes out and really turns the volume up to 11 as they say. I'm...not really sure what role the large convulsive rodent plays in the band but I've discovered that as long as you occasionally throw cheese slices at the stage everything remains copacetic. Bring your cheese! :x

I'm always up for a bit of sport and so I booked a full night of Death Rabbit (tm) action and decided to go with the full tournament package. I must say I'm mighty impressed with the stock of feisty animals that are in attendance. If you decide to wager please understand that Necromancy guild is running the whole show so it would be unwise indeed to default on any debt you may accrue.

In the spirit of the holidays I brought in some rather old friends for a rather spirited game of "Fez Toss". No malice is present and it's all in good fun so feel free to don a fez and see how far someone from the old country can toss you. The pool is very large and it's extremely unlikely that they can clear the pool with one mighty heave. Well...fairly unlikely. Wear padding?

Sorry for all this quickly written nonsense. I've just been beaten down by work lately and I was feeling bad that I haven't got to any hot blog action as of late and so I kind of whipped this out of thin air. I can see birthday bunny is not amused with my silly scribbles so I'll just take my leave by asking my patient audience to leave a quick missive describing what ideal gift they would like to receive at this moment in their life.

Awwww look at mr. sourpuss. So beaten down by life and saddened by his inability to live in San Francisco. Why do people much more intelligent then he continuously argue with children on the OT board about religion & politics? Why do so few people read and when they do it's 99% of the time a book assigned to them by some learning institution? Why, oh why do the creators of fine ancent history programs keep going to the paleontologist Jack Horner for his views on the Tyrannosaurus Rex when his claims of the T-Rex being an obligate scavenger and an overall train wreck of a therapod are flimsy and foolish to even the most casual observer?

These are grim times indeed that we live in my friends. When depression hits Daemon hard, he fights back in the only way he knows how -- he goes shopping. He's stuck at work and his mind is slowly entering the dark place in which his head is squeezed like a vice and there is only a halfway decent mall at his disposal a quick jot away. Clothes? What again?! You only have an hour for lunch so there's not enough time and beside, nobody cares what you look like especially at work. Wait, I know! A new gaming system!

Ooooooh! So new and shiny! In all honesty, I was going to get one earlier this year but when I found out about the new slimline models coming out I decided to just wait in order to get what I hope to be an improved version. Like with any system, the later models are always better but it's not always easy to decide how long to wait. We Americans are so dreadfully programmed to consume in order to keep the vicious world cycle in place so it's not always easy to keep the gears in idle and enjoy what one already has.

I went ahead and bought the Daxter package as I was a smidge worried about getting an older model PSP. I had read very positive things about the Daxter game anyways and this particular bundle also came with a memory stick which was nice as it saved me from having to make yet another side purchase to make my system work properly. It also came with some Family Guy compilation which I still haven't looked at. I never found myself on the trendy backlash Family Guy hate train express that I saw so many board due to the South Park scuffle, bit still I see the show all the time so its presence is just sort of...meh.

I went ahead and picked up Ghost in the Shell - SAC and Tekken - Dark Resurrection as I am quite a big fan of both franchises. A whole new world of gaming was now open to me! But unfortunately in the throes of my manic depression I was just a tad overwhelmed at the choices presented to me at the gaming store. I took my initial purchases and bolted from the store so as not to squander what time I had left on my lunch break.

Tekken DR is amazing and I must say I'm quite impressed! The screen of the PSP seem enormous compared to other handheld systems and the colors are so lush and full and Tekken seems to take full advantage of the power of the PSP. I've just been lazy so far and I'm trying to get my Craig Marduk game back so I'm not so awful and I played a little bit of the requisite sumo character Ganryu. I tried to play with one of the new characters called Lili but I was doing so bad that I got frustrated and went back to Marduk as I have better natural reactions playing him. Really I can't say enough about how amazing this game is.

I have to admit that it's only been a few days and I haven't got to the Ghost in the Shell game as of yet. I know the game got very average reviews but so did the PS2 game and I loved that game so much that I had to make myself stop playing it as the unplayed games started piling up to a rather embarassing level. I'm also a crazy fan of the GITS series and to tell you the truth as long as the game isn't broken or incredbily frustrating I'm sure I'll have a good time with it.

One of the games that convinced me that I had to buy a PSP was Jeanne d'Arc. I haven't picked it up yet as I made a small agreement with what passes for my mind that I would get a bit more gametime in with the other purchases before I bought more virtual distractions from work. I've read many reviews for Blade Dancer as well so I'm sure I'll pick it up soon as well and I keep eyeing all sorts of RPGs so I hoping to have some grindtastic fun in the near future.

It's been a handful of days and so far I'm very happy with my purchase. The system is amazing and I'm suprised at the overall lack of support it seems to get from the gaming companies as well as the gaming community. Ah well, my breaks at work are now a lot more fun and I bought it just in time it seems for the television set in our break room appears to be on the fritz. Yay me?

Does anybody have the system and what titles do you love or recommend?

December 25th 1976. It was an overcast and very rainy day in Oceanside California. In the 70's it was common for a deluge of rainstorms to hit Southern California during the winter months and this year was no exception.

This Christmas, however, was not cause for great celebration for Daemon. During the waning months of every year he was routinely struck down with strange & violent variations of Strep Throat and this year the illness decided to visit him on Christmas Day. Try though he might to make it to the living room to enjoy in the festivities, alas his illness was too great and the waves of nausea too powerful and so he just laid there and drifted in and out of sleep.

As consciousness became something more familiar to Daemon, he began to take in some fluids and watch whatever daytime Christmas specials that were dancing upon the television set. Carefully his parents weighed his newfound condition of lucidity and tiptoed in a very large box festooned with the usual holiday trappings. Daemon's feeble hands slowly tore the images of happy snowmen away from the trapped box which had the words "Electronic Video Game" printed upon its exterior. Ladies and gentlemen I present to you the first video game console I owned...

:shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock::shock:

The Hanimex 7771

Truly an epic moment in my life although at the moment I was oh so very sick and at 12 years old one doesn't tend to sit back and view things in their proper historical context. All I cared about was that I was sick as hell but I got to play pong in my bed! What sort of exciting games did this console have on it? Let's look...

Pong "Tennis" ~ It's the original that it still spoken about in hushed and reverent tones to this day! You versus the computer or you could take on an opponent like your scruffy brother who has no appreciation for the proper ownership of anything in your room. You will take him down like the fake twin your mother dressed him up to be. Sorry...(inner dialogue daemon).

Pong"Hockey" ~ Um...okay. This was a rather difficult game. You and your opponent both control two bars with your paddles at the same time. The bars closest to the middle are the "attackers" and the bars guarding the the goal gaps on the far sides are appropriately enough called "defenders". You controlled the defender on your side and the attacker on your opponent's side. Sounds easy right? Well it wasn't.

By the by, you may notice that the machine pictured has a setting for Football and no mention of Hockey. That's because the best pictures I could find of my long lost system are the British and Australian version which had the "hockey" option presented as "football" or "soccer" as it's known in the states and "futbol" as it's known in Southern California. You kids in the States remember soccer right? That's the sport that for 40 years they've been telling us is getting more and more popular in the U.S. but it never does? I thought so.

Pong "Squash" ~ Another odd cookie that was actually very hard due to the, at times, incredible speed at which the ball moved. I had fun confuddling my opponents ability to distinguish between his paddle and mine by randomly flicking my dial so fast that it made the paddle images bleed together. Oh what a young scamp I was!:P But I was out to win at all costs!:x

What?! I'm sorry but the word squash suddenly makes me think of a most excellent Squash player from Britain that goes by the name of Vicky Botwright. What?!:evil: She's really a good player and an excellent athlete and she keeps herself very fit and well...:oops: Let's move on shall we?

Pong "Squash Practice" ~ All right, I'm not going to lie to you. No matter how bored we were in the 70's NOBODY played this game. If it came down to this game and digging holes in the ground so that my Hot Wheels had cool tunnels to travel through then rest assured I would be out there on my hands and knees getting all dirty like little boys are want to do.

Why this trip down memory lane? Well up until two days ago I never knew what my pong system was. I vividly remembered what it looked like but it was a fairly plain no-name model and most pong sites just have walls of text of all the various machines that were floating around in the 70's. Up until now, whenever anybody asked me what my first home console was all I had was a small fuzzy picture of the system in a group shot of various pong machines.

By pure chance I stumbled across an old computer system site that had walls of text accompanied by small pictures! Let me tell you the excitement and hope I held out as my tremulous hands spun on the mouse dial was something to be seen. At long last, my quest had ended and the kingdom could sleep in peace once more.

First consoles anyone?

Oh lordy! Run for your lives it's another shipment of Naruto!:o

Arrggh! Three more Naruto manga released at the same time...AGAIN!:cry: So once again I have become buried under 500 + copies of shiny new Naruto manga and guess what? Just like volume 18, volume 21 comes with free stickers!:cry::cry: Once more I have to question the sanity of the good folks over at SJ comics for such a move but I'm sure a lot of people have and business is business I suppose.

I realize this is a great thing if you're a Naruto fan and you're tired of waiting for issues to get translated and published, but if you're a general manga fan then this type of avalanche of product from a massive best seller really takes a lot of focus away from other new releases. I don't think this was Shonen Jump's intention but that's the end result for those of us in the manga business who have worked hard to create and maintain a central "new release" release display.

Apparently this is going to happen once more when 22,23 & 24 come out so I have that to look forward to :roll:. Luckily we are rapidly headed towards the Xmas season and thus the product should at least be flying out the door at even more rapid of a pace then it usually does. Realistically I'm just being grumpy I suppose. I work hard to push a lot of smaller manga titles and I'm none to fond of product floods of this nature but I guess it's better than no new product coming in.

The flood of Naruto certainly didn't hurt the sales of the Bleach. Issue 21 is still selling like crazy in my little corner of the world and in my little corner I've sold in the neighborhood of $160,000 worth of manga so far this year so being a best seller means a lot in my world. Now I'm off to read the rest of Tekkon Kinkreet which I'll discuss at a later date. But for now...

*Throws rocks at Shonen Jump building*

The two week sumo aki basho tournament ended this weekend and my oh my it was a bit of a doozy. The race for the trophy was wide open as the 4th best Yokozuna in the history of the sport, Asashoryu, was forced to sit this one out due to Japan's proclivity for "hammering down the nail that stands out" as well as good old fashion racism. This meant that all bets were off as everyone was assured that they would have at least one more win under their belts with Asashoryu gone and that the people just underneath him had a very good opportunity handed to them. So who won the tournament?

Hakuho the other mongolian Yokozuna (sorry, currently no Japanese wrestlers are good enough to make Yokozuna). Despite an initial stumble by losing on the first day :roll: , Hakuho managed to hold on and only lost one other match during the entire 15 day tournament to capture the cup. This was a great achievement as he was a Dai-Yokozuna (1st appearance as a Yokozuna) and he chose the dreaded Shiranui type for his Dohyo-iri (ring entering ceremony) which is generally considered bad luck and nobody has done this for quite a while (in fact the last Yokozuna who chose that type never won a single tournament). So hurrah for Hakuho and all that! What did our Yokozuna win?

The GIANT Emperor's cup! :shock: Humorously, a very small older man from the sumo committee is typically giving the cup away and they always like to watch him attempt to hand the cup over to the winner and then everyone rushes in to catch him before he is crushed under the weight of the mighty cup. Oh what kidders those sumo folk are...

Yay! Ummm...papers?! Well it's always nice to have something that you can frame and put on the wall for when you're old and people think you never accomplished anything in your life I suppose.

The mongolian "Manly Cup" and no I'm not kidding about the name. Mongolian men are very big on being manly and they have some pretty rough competitions to prove their manliness level all the time in ye olde Mongolia.

Now we're talking! A Djinni in modern Japan of all places! Seriously though, sumo has a lot of supporters from around the world and the handing out of trophies takes about 40 minutes or so. Whoof! That's a lot of hardware. I wonder if any big ol' conglomerates have their hand in any of these sumo goings on?

Hooray! The Americans have their hands all up in that business fo' sho! Gazing upon this real life serious trophy for a couple weeks of very hard work makes all those strange video game racing trophies seem not so strange now eh?

Lastly, there's the traditional parade -- in a new car -- as they ride their way all the way home taking all the winning banners with them to bling up their heya (wrestling stable). Yes indeed, there will be much drinking tonight my friends.

The crown prince of Japan Naruhito and his wife were in attendance during the closing days of the tournament as was their precious daughter the princess Aiko who is already a very big sumo fan. Seriously, she's just 6 years old but if you ask her about the wrestlers she can tell what stable they come from and what their favorite techniques are. Her favorite wrestler is the newly promoted Ozeki Kotomitsuki about whom many people were nervous would lose the match during her attendance and thus put the princess in a serious funk. Luckily for all Kotomitsuki triumphed and the princess was saved and all was well in the kingdom of Japan -- well at least in the world of sumo.

There was a rather odd occurrence during the middle of tournament in which a woman suddenly attempted to ascend the dohyo and get into the ring with a big pile of papers clutched to her chest. One of the YDC (Yokozuna Deliberation Council) members managed to hook her foot and the sumo wrestler Takamisakari (who rather ironically for this particular situation is in actuality known as ROBOCOP due to his stiff, awkward, robot-like movements) sprang into action and apprehended the ne'er do well.

This is actually a bigger deal then you may realize as women are not allowed up on the dohyo for those pesky old time spiritual and religious reasons. Remember, Sumo is not just a sport, it's a way of life and its many traditions are bound up in the trappings of ceremonial spiritual rites that are so old that many origins of these traditions are lost to time. So many times, if you were to ask me "Why do the wrestlers throw salt in the ring before they wrestle daemon?" I would have to sadly inform you that nobody actually knows this. Anyways, the lady in question just had a bunch of strange doodles on her papers and she was quite obviously mentally unstable but harmless so the sumo gang decided not to prosecute her and the news folks politely blurred her face to save her family any embarassment.

Another fun odd thing that happened was the mongolian wrestler Ama (I know, Mongolians are all over the place in sumo buddy boy) body slamming up and coming new hot japanese wrestler named Goeido. Now Ama is a very technical wrestler who is very light as far as body weight goes. He has put on some weight over the years but it's not been easy for him and so he has had to struggle with wrestling all the big boys with nothing but pure skill. Goeido is himself a technical wrestler although not on quite the level as Ama, and this was his first time in the big leagues. He and Ama had at each other with very quick grip reversals and body twists and suddenly Ama found himself behind Goeido. Typically a wrestler just pushes the other guy out when he gets in this position but Ama just hesitated, found his grip and...

What is he...? Oh no it's...

...time to feel a lot of sudden pain Goeido!

Ama just casually walked away immediately as if nothing had happened leaving a rather stunned sumo wrestler on the ground as well as a rather stunned audience. The announcer immediately commented that the move was "Very Asashoryu like". Ama just wanted to let the new kid know that you can't just come up from the minor leagues and expect to roll over the upper echelon like he had been doing for most of the tournament. Welcome to the big leagues kid -- if you get lazy you're going to get hurt.

It was a very entertaining tournament despite the aforementioned absence of Asashoryu but now Daemon's are sad because he has to wait another two months until the next one happens. At least Adult Swim started showing Cowboy Bebop again so I have something to watch late at night and not feel so sad.