An Escalating Metro Race

The broken Rosslyn Metro escalator was empty when I boarded this past Thursday morning so I cruised down the left at about 60% normal speed. It was a lovely stroll until I heard…the footsteps. The footsteps telling you trouble is on the way. Someone's in a hurry to catch the Metro and nothing's getting in their way. I knew the sound well, having made it a few times myself, but my gut told me this Metrorusher wouldn't have the courtesy to say "excuse me" on the way down.

My fellow Metrogoer would soon pass me, probably with a nice shove for good measure. I had a 20-step headstart, but I didn't want to get passed by any horseshoe wearer. I started walking faster at 80% of my usual stepping speed. But then I heard faster clickety-claks. Suddenly she sounded like a thoroughbred. Could she tell I was walking faster to stay in front of her? I wasn’t going to block her way if she caught up to me, but I could at least put up a good fight.

15 steps later she had moved within 10 steps of me. She was still closing the distance. I ramped up to my normal stepping speed that actually equaled her feverish sprinting and maintained a 6-step distance for the middle third of stairs. But the noise of her walking kept my heart racing. She was right behind me. I could almost smell her breath. She could make her move in the next five seconds and pass me before I had a chance to retaliate.

In one motion I looked over my shoulder, through her eyes, and into her soul. I could see her plans for a takeover at 30 steps to go - her loud shoes jackhammering all the way down, getting louder and louder as she neared the finish line. I saw people at the bottom laughing at me for losing a 20-step headstart to Miss Heavyfoot. Someone would probably throw an egg on my head and kids would point. The ridicule would be too much for 6:30 in the morning.

I returned her gaze so she could see the fire within. This was not going to be her victorious day. No, it would be mine. I turned my head forward, grabbed the left rail, and I was off. My soles barely met the steps. Clickety-clak saw the growing distance and knew she had lost. With 20 steps to go I no longer heard her hooves.

5 Hours of NBA Jam T.E.

The other weekend, I played 5 consecutive hours of NBA Jam Tournament Edition for Genesis. My head pounded for the next two days so maybe this marathon playing has passed me by since I am getting older afterall. It got started because TV offered no good choices and my XBox won't be opened for three weeks. I was always a decent Jam player, but I never dominated my friends in Jam like I still do in NHL 95. Tournament Ediition added lots of extra power-ups that you could choose before playing without any codes. It also offers a greater statistics, player ratings, and rosters. Of course, being an Acclaim game, there are plenty of secret power-ups and hidden characters.

I still remember going to "Nobody Beats the Wiz" in Paramus and getting the original NBA Jam the day it was released. It was the only game I got right away. After spending plenty of quarters at its arcade machine, I'm sure my parents were happy to know this only cost them a one-time fee of $50. It was hard for me to get past the idea that I could play this for free whenever I wanted to in my house. Down with visits to the arcade!

Time for some ugly basketbrawling. (original NBA Jam)

NBA Jam has always been a fun and fluid game. Like my NHL 95 cartridge's battery, the NBA Jam battery has seen better days and no longer saves my information. Therefore, to beat all 27 or so teams, I had to keep the Genesis on the entire time. I recognize I could have taken a break by walking away with the Genesis on, but that would've been too easy. I set the timer to extra fast and the drone difficulty to 4 (out of 5). I chose the Jazz b/c I still love seeing a pixelated John Stockton throw it down on the baseline. The combination of 2 3-point shooters and a dunker with a high creativity rating made for a good run.

Tournament Edition places a higher emphasis on injuring your opponent by shoving him to the floor. The more times they're shoved, the slower they become. Against the computer, this is pretty easy to pull off because it doesn't always recognize the rational thing to do when it's getting pummelled. Versus a human, it's a real beatdown on both ends. I was losing after the first quarter in about 1/4 of the games because I kept knocking people down. This strategy worked well and paid off later on b/c the computer had few healthy options by the 3rd and 4th quarters.

I usually had the following rotation: Qtr. 1 - Stockton and Malone, Qtr. 2 - Malone and Hornacek, Qtr 3. - Stockton and Hornacek (sometime Malone if he wasn't hurt badly and I needed the extra help), and Qtr. 4 - Stockton and Malone. By not playing on the highest difficulty, I got away with two short PGs in the 3rd. For the next rainy day, I will try the highest setting. I have no plans to use any later versions, especially when they put Keith Van Horn on the 1999 cover.

I noticed some aspects of the game: the CPU will make every full-court shot which means you must be up by 4 to win the game if there is even a second on the clock, the FT line hook shot is deadly, it hurts my pride getting knocked over by Spudd Webb but feels even better to dunk on him, hearing "boomshakalaka", "oh my!", "he's on fire!", and "ugly shot" never gets old, a 1995 game lets you think about how many dynasties the NBA was supposed to have in places like Orlando and Charlotte...provided MJ never played, how many paycheck piligers in the videogame are still playing today, and not having MJ and Shaq to play with sucks.

Make sure your battery works so you can play against the developers and their special teams after unlocking them (as if anyone will take my advice and use this blog when playing this game). Turning off the Genesis also loses the unlocked All-Star team that replaces the Rookies, as well as really expanded rosters with 5 or 6 players. I lost two games over my 5-hour marathon, with an exciting win over the knicks that required 4 goaltends and "on fire" 3's from Malone in the last minute to send the game to OT. This is still a great 2-player game that's lots of fun with options like 9-point full court dunks, bomb earthquakes, and speed bursts.

This should be the last mid-90's Genesis game review for a long time as I leap forward in videogame technology to 2001 when the XBox was released. Once my XBox gets fired up, the genesis will start collecting more dust, unless of course you want to play Genesis for old time's sake.

Really, you can't be THAT dumb, can you?

I was driving in a neighborhood parking lot yesterday morning and saw some youth (or yoot) driving his blue two-door car with his driverside window down. There'd be nothing wrong with this except for the fact that every remaining square inch of his car was covered in 1.5 inches of snow. He was driving his car by sticking his head out the window! Hello? McFly? Anybody in there? Try cleaning off your car. I know this sounds crazy, but when you remove snow from your window, you get to see through the window. Incredible. And I thought people who didn't remove the snow off the roofs of their cars were going to be today's topic - not when someone drives his car with his head out the window because it's covered in snow.

Who needs clear windows to drive?

Giada De Laurentiis' Gigantic Head

Whenever I'd like to feel bad about my cooking inability and simple meals, I'll watch the Food Network. It does have some nice shows like "Good Eats" with Alton Brown (thanks for the steak receipe!), but there are a few shows/hosts that are unwatchable. Certainly, for a station like Food Network, a show's success has a little to do with the food prepared, and a whole lot to do with the host's personality. A nice amount of easy, medium, and hard cooking shows must be struck. I'd imagine the majority of viewers are confident with their skillset and want to watch a show that's one level above them. Therefore, many shows are just above basic/generic homecooking. A channel of professional chefs would alienate typical viewers, while too many episodes of "How to Boil Water" would be insulting.

On "Everyday Italian", Giada De Laurentiis takes the usual homemade Italian dish and spices it up (too easy, I know) with some nice twists. I really only have two issues with the show. I'm not one to speak about someone's hairstyle (though I've got a relative who should), but I'm going to anyway. Giada could really use a different hairstyle that doesn't actually accentuate her incredibly large forehead. Stop pushing the hair behind your ears, you're not doing yourself any favors. Don't get me wrong, she's still easy on the eyes, but a slight change would do wonders. The way things are, her head looks like a fully-inflated helium balloon attached to a helium tank.

Of course, let's pretend the Food Network only puts cooks on TV because of their abilities and not appearance. You can stop laughing now. No, it's okay, I'll wait. Are you done? Ok. Now back to our friendly "Everyday Italian". The cooking is well done and looks like it would taste great, but the production is too distracting. When Giada says, "I'll mash the potatoes in this bowl," the camera does a very tight shot of the bowl and the mashing. It's an abrupt move that disorients the viewer. If they could just zoom out a little bit before taking the shot, viewers would easily orient themselves. Otherwise it's too jarring. I know closeups of cooking actions are key to a cooking show, but it shouldn't be used for every onion slice or dash of salt. It's as if the producer has a fetish for her hands and must give them as much facetime as the food.

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It's Time For Apocalyptic Snowfall!

We're supposed to get some snowflakes later today and through the night. About 2-4" when things stop tomorrow morning so it's not much. Of course, the season's first snowfall means it's not only time to get your shovels out of the shed, but also for news directors and producers to "blow" everything out of proportion for higher ratings, not to menton (so I will) lots of stupid banter between anchors and weatherpeople.

Since it's a 1/3", a reporter MUST say it's a treacherous walk since any snow is dangerous.

This is a weak system, yet we'll still be told from Stormcenter or Stormbase or Storm Headquarters that the storm team or stormwatch or storm alert is watching or out on patrol or blanketing (oh those news directors are so funny!) the area to cover this snowfall event or major activity or solid disturbance and use the Live Duel Double Doppler Millennium Falcon 3-D Tracking XT 3000 Delta Radar. Like opening up a new present, I can't wait to see what every station calls its "thingy". Radar titles are winter's TV station pissing contest.

I love irony.

All the while telling us they'll give the "latest information you need to know". Gee, really thanks for not telling me old news that I don't care about...and for already assuming you know what I want to hear, but nevermind that, you just go ahead. It's really the viewer's fault for relying on TV for local news since he/she knows what he/she is getting with them, or is it that TV news departments know what you're going to get because they know what "news you need to know" so you're getting what you should get, but just didn't know it yet?

Awww how sweet...an anchor actually had to write her own material.

Even the DC area handles a system of this size with ease, so let's save all the hyperbole and shots of reporters walking through snow (if only for us to laugh at while we're warm inside our homes) for storms with a minimum total of 7".

Who's the genius that came up with this idea?

Depending on my workday carpooling route, I swing over the Key Bridge into Rosslyn. Amid wild bikers and pedestrians who think they're safe when they cross anywhere, but the crosswalk, is an annoyingly-placed Rosslyn map. It's about 5-feet tall and 2.5-feet wide with an overview of Rosslyn's main streets. While I'm sure it helps out-of-towners (though I've never seen someone look at it), its location at North Nash Street and Wilson Boulevard couldn't be worse.

Thanks to Google Maps, you too can see the intersection in all of its glory. Since the right onto Wilson is a yield and you look down Wilson for other cars, people, bikers, and oompa-loompas, you're blocked from seeing everything because of the sign. When checking the leftside of the intersection, I have to look left of the sign and then quickly to the right (of the sign) and assume I didn't miss anyone blocked behind it in the center. It does so well at challenging turning drivers that I think someone in the DOT placed it there at that angle on purpose. It's impossible to accidently position an obstacle like this when it's so good at blocking the view on the left.

So that's why it's called a window pane

Late last month, Timothy Durfield broke into a Concord, New Hampshire hair salon looking for what I'd expect to only be money (unless he was going to steal shampoo and sell it). When the police showed up, he tried diving through a window, only to get stuck and cut himself on the broken glass. He was cuffed after firefighters got him out of the 9-by-15-inch frame. (Thanks for the link Eric.)

Despite this entry's title, a window's "pane" originated from "[Middle English, section, pane of glass, from Old French pan, piece of cloth, panel, from Latin pannus, cloth. See pan- in Indo-European Roots.]", and not some idiot criminal who felt pain from a pane.