150,008

I haven't posted here in years, but it's time that streak came to an end.
Tonight I was playing Rocket League on the Xbox and when the match ended, an achievement popped for 75 gamerscore. Turns out this was the one that put me over the 150k mark.

This post is my mini celebration of this monumental achievement in my life.

Insane in the brain

So this afternoon, after visiting the gym, I was feeling a little bit hungry as people often do after sweating to the oldies (or in this case, to the clean version of MDNA). I imagine that people who are truly devoted to their physical health probably solve this by downing a protein shake, or perhaps some baked chicken and rice. I have nothing in common with those folks.

I wanted to try that new Taco Bell taco that has a shell made out of Doritos.

Today was very rainy, so I headed to the drive-thru, where the lady had a bit of difficulty understanding my order. I told her I wanted one Doritos taco, but not a "Supreme" like it comes, I wanted them to make it like a regular old taco. Once we established this, I also ordered a regular taco...(for comparison purposes).

After a few minutes, I had my food. I pulled into the parking lot to dine, having no intention of driving around with these things another minute longer. Tacos are difficult to eat while driving and besides, this is for SCIENCE. I had to eat them while they were as fresh as Taco Bell food can possibly be.

I tried the regular taco first. It tasted exactly like it's supposed to. People say a lot of negative things about Taco Bell, but I've always enjoyed it. Even though I hear some of their ingredients barely qualify as actual food, it's still one of the tastier fast food options out there.

 Next, it was time for the Doritos Loco Taco.  This is what it looked like:

The shell is a giant Dorito, as advertised. It shares all of the Dorito properties you have come to know and love, both good and bad. For example, the shell turns your fingers orange. This was OK with me, considering that this was a meal for science. Unfortunately, it also shares the same durability as your average Dorito and that's a problem.

The thing cracked immediately when I touched it. Normally, this might mean a bunch of Taco ingredients falling all over the place, but Taco Bell has wisely included a cardboard taco-shaped sleeve to catch all the ingredients as your novelty taco shell disintegrates before your very eyes.

Each bite further reduced the giant Dorito back to it's natural form (smaller Doritos). It tasted just fine (as it turns out, Doritos actually go quite well with tacos), but it sure was messy. Compared to the regular Taco, this crazy nacho cheese flavored shell doesn't hold together at all. By the time I was finished, I had a lot of taco ingredients to scoop out of the cardboard sleeve with my orange fingers.

Overall...it was fun to try once, but unless Taco Bell figures out how to make a stronger Dorito, I'm not ordering this again.

G-Y-P....Madonna!

Last month, I ordered a couple of tickets to Madonna's concert in Seattle, to give to Heather for her birthday. The concert isn't until the fall, so I think she was adequately surprised, and pleased...which is always the mark of a good birthday gift.

As anyone who browsed ticketmaster knows, tickets to Madonna's concerts are fairly pricey. This year, moreso than ever. One of the things I thought made the price sting just a tiny bit less (and please keep in mind that I'm only talking about the small difference between nearly 400 bees stinging you and "just" 350 bees stinging you instead) is that a complimentary copy of her new album "MDNA" was included with the purchase of each ticket.

"Well that's cool, at least I don't have to buy that too."

On Monday evening, UPS showed up at our door, with an express delivery package that surely cost at least 10 bucks to ship, even at a bulk rate. It was kind of cool to be getting the album a day early, because I'm still one of those folks that purchases my music instead of stealing it online like most everyone else does. They've probably had the album since Christmas, but for me, this was a big deal. I felt pretty awesome...that is until I opened up the package and saw these:

For the uninitiated, you're looking at two copies of the "Clean", standard edition of the album. Like many artists today, Madonna has decided to release multiple versions of her album at retail, and this is the worst of the bunch.

I can't imagine that anyone over at Madonna's camp thinks that her fans would actually prefer the version of her album with the least amount of songs on it (11 compared to the "deluxe" version's 17). I can't imagine they think we're worried about hearing the naughty words in her songs considering we just paid in advance to hear them live. The only possibility that's left is that they're not just hoping, but assuming that we'll go out and buy the "real" CD at retail...and that maybe these might make nice gifts for friends. Friends who only want 64% of the album that is.

LAME.

I haven't even listened to the album yet, because until this morning, it was still in the plastic wrap. I was thinking I might try to sell it on Ebay except hundreds of other people had the same idea, and copies of the "free ticketmaster version" are currently going for 5 bucks or less. 

You don't need to zoom in on the picture below, but if you do...you'll how much the most recent auction ended for. That poor bastard LOST money on the deal.

So, since I can't sell them, and I don't know anyone I dislike enough to give one to, I went ahead and cracked the plastic on my stupid, non-deluxe, non-parental advisory, non-awesome version of MDNA and I'm going to listen to it at the gym today.

You win, Madonna.

Happy New Years!

Figured I'd start the year off with a blog post and see how long I can keep that little tradition going. Started the year off with a leisurely brunch at Ivar's Salmon House on Lake Union, then visited with family for a bit. It was a pretty lazy day, except for a mad dash to Best Buy at 6:30pm to pick up a copy of LA Noire for the Xbox for only 9.99. It was some crazy unadvertised sale, and that was an awesome price for that game.

Achievements Unlocked

    For the last 106 days straight, I've been on an impressive gaming streak. Actually, I suppose the term "impressive" may not apply, as I'm pretty sure I'm the only person who was really aware of this streak. So, I will rephrase and say that for the last 106 days, I've managed to do something to impress myself.

    This particular streak wasn't about playing a different game every day (that was last year), or gaming every day (that particular streak is actually longer, and is still in progress). This streak was called a "Score Streak"...and was being tracked by 360voice.com. For 3 months and 14 days straight, I managed to get an Xbox achievement every single day.

    Getting an achievement once a day was pretty difficult, and I'm actually not sure how I managed to last as long as I did. Sure, there are some easy achievements out there, but most of them require playing your game for at least a little while before you complete whatever goal it is you're trying to complete. That meant that whether I was at home, at work, or even traveling...I had to find some time to play a game for long enough to get some gamerscore. For the last three months and fourteen days, that's exactly what I did.

    There were some days where it was easy (weekends at home for example), and some days where it was really hard. I don't really remember how I managed to rack up that many days in a row...but I do remember where I was and what I was doing when I killed the streak. This Monday night, I was in New York City traveling for work. I'd been working all day long, and even though I brought an Xbox with me (and I always have Xbox games on my phone now), I just didn't feel like chasing an achievement. I ended up playing some Call of Duty, and before I knew it, it was midnight...and my opportunity to keep the streak going was over.

    So I lost my gamerscore streak because I was having fun gaming. I'm ok with that. I still have my "consecutive days of gaming" streak, and that's at 161 days....and counting.