Category: Uncategorized

I’m a big fan of Canadian actor Keanu Reeves and he rarely makes these types of videos, so it’s good to see him have a bit of fun. I wonder if he voted or is going to vote in the federal election? Oh wait, I think he might be classified as one of those Canadians who can’t vote. He’s in the same boat as Donald Sutherland I believe.

Apparently there are very few details about what’s going on in the above video. We know this is some sorta river rafting excursion. We know there are four ladies in one of the rafts. One of them is actively paddling. Two of them are fighting each and I’ve read they might be sisters. There’s a fourth female who seems to be completely incapacitated by what’s going on and she doesn’t seem to be too pleased to be on that raft.

I’d say that fighting on raft while going down a fast-moving river isn’t the safest thing to do.

Someone in my general vicinity at work was farting up a storm today. This was happening for a good portion of the day. The surprising thing was, it wasn’t me! Did I notice the farts because I could hear them? Nope. I could smell them instead. They were powerful and pungent in odour.

I have to give them credit, they let loose very silently. Because of this, I have no idea who out of the five or six people around me could have done it. I couldn’t even fathom a guess at who it could have been. I was also impressed by how they were able to keep farting over the course of several hours. To keep generating that much gas for that long without having to go poop is truly impressive.

I hope I don’t have to keep smelling farts at work tomorrow.

Well, I managed to catch a cold towards the end of last week. If my faulty memory serves me correctly, I haven’t been struck down with a bonafide illness since the end of February when I had a brief but intense battle with the flu. My recovery from that somewhat miraculous, allowing me to fly down to San Diego without any problems.

As for my current malady, it’s a minor in the grand scheme of things. A minor sore throat on Friday, that transitioned to some minor nasal congestion over the week, and to a minor dry cough today. All things that did not knock me out nor confine me to bed but enough to be an annoyance as I am not feeling 100%. I suppose I should be thankful I went over six months between illnesses but that’s a small consolation prize.

I was wondering, is it better to suffer a week with minor symptoms like I have now or having your ass kicked for two straight days but then be fine? As painful as my last flu was, I’m thinking the shorter time period might be worth it.

Alas, this is just an exercise in thought, I still have a few more days of this to endure.

The title of this post sums up what you’re about to see in the above video but some context is good to have. According to what I’ve found, the video shows a 40-year old Japanese man who is streaming live onto the Internet. Some people say he’s streaming to Twitch but I’m not sure of that. The computerized female voice you hear in the video is from a program that converts the text of people chatting with him to voice. If you watch the video from the beginning, you can see he’s adjusting or doing some maintenance on a lighter of sorts. At one point he adds lighter fluid to the lighter. At several points in the video, he uses tissues to wipe off excess lighter fluid from the lighter and his hands, and discards the tissues in a plastic bag next to him.

He then uses a striker to make sparks which is when all hell breaks loose. I invite you at this point to watch the plethora of mistakes and poor decisions he manages to make over the course of several minutes. At several points, he easily could have extinguished the fire had he been smart but he winds up literally adding more fuel to the fire.

I tried to find out what happened after the stream dies. According to this version of the video, the aftermath was as follows:

“Fire occurred at around 12:45 PM on October 4. Dude (age 40) lives with three other people in the two-story home, including his father (68) and mother (73). The identity of the fourth person isn’t stated. Four people were injured, suffering from burns and other unspecified injuries. This includes the above three people and a female relative (62) that lives nearby. About 30% of the home burned down (37 square meters out of a total of 125). Fire department reports that the son was upstairs and accidentally dropped a lit oil-based lighter into a garbage bag, igniting the fire.”

If this is true, I’m glad no one died but it’s unfortunate there were injuries, especially burns, associating with the seniors. His stupidity sure was costly.

Lastly, because of the text-to-voice program, we can actually hear what people were saying when they were watching this live. Someone from Reddit translated the chat:

The text-to-voice thing is a nice touch. An off-the-cuff translation:

“Behind you. Behind you. Look Behind you.”

“Where did he go? Is he coming back?”

“The fire extinguisher. Use the fire extinguisher.”

“Whaaaaaaat???”

“Holy shit..” (UAAAAA!)

“Why did you take it over there?”

“Call 119” (Japanese 911)

“Find a way to smother it.”

“Whaaaa”

“Don’t you have a futon (thin Japanese mattress) you can put on it?”

“If you don’t smother it it’s not going to go out.”

“Call 119 or use your fire extinguisher.”

“Call 119. Why did this even happen??”

I can’t wait to see how this guy explains what happened in his next stream.

Around 3pm today I was informed I could no longer attend the NHL 16 wrap party. I was told the party was really only for the core team and their spouses/partners. They wanted to keep the party intimate and for the team, not for any outsiders. I understood that and since it’s their party, they can do whatever they want. My friend on NHL was disappointed I could not join him this evening but I assured him it was quite alright. I believe my team’s production coordinator was even more disappointed I wasn’t going. She scored a ticket to the party as an organizer and we were joking at lunch that if I had enough drinks I’d be doing the worm on the dance floor. Well, let’s be honest, if I were going to the party, I don’t think I’d be able to pull of the worm, it’d more like kicks and thumbs.

This evening, I’ll be attending the NHL 16 wrap party as a guest of my friend. Said friend has a wife but I think she has grown tiresome of these things, as she’s had the chance to attend many of them. I suppose there are only so many parties, attended by so many nerds that you can stand before you’d rather just stay home.

This is actually the same friend who allowed me to be his +1 for the EA holiday party last January. That indirectly led me to having my current job, so I still owe a great debt of gratitude to him. I’ve never attended someone’s wrap party other than my own. Other than my friend, I don’t know anyone on the NHL 16 dev team. That team sits two floors below me, so I’m sure they’ve seen my face around. I bet they’ll recognize me at the party and wonder why I’m there.

I feel like I’ll probably stick close to my friend for most of the party. I guess this is what it feels like to be a game development spouse when they attend one of these shindigs. I’m gonna quietly drink their beverages, eat their food, and hopefully win one of their raffle prizes (if they have any).

This week Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 5 came out, the latest in the long line of video games featuring the legendary skateboarder.

As you might recall, I was part of the team that made three skateboarding games for EA in direct competition to Tony’s games. Despite having much higher critical acclaim, EA no longer makes skateboarding games and has left the genre for Activision to do as they see fit.

The latest entry to the Pro Skater line of games is not off to good start. Gaming review sites have almost been unanimous with comments critical of the bugs and odd design decisions that are present in the game. In the video above, you can see for yourself what is currently ailing the game. As a telling sign, the game required a day-one patch that was actually larger than the game on disk, though I wouldn’t have any experience with such matters.

Many people who have commented on these reviews and videos of Pro Skater 5 have called for EA to make skate 4. I don’t know what the EA executives think when they read these comments. In the end, a fourth skate game will probably not be made and it all boils down to money. It just wouldn’t make money for EA. In the meantime, we get to enjoy more Tony Hawk.

Here’s a cat eating mashed potatoes from KFC.

I had to poop at work today which isn’t really newsworthy by itself. What is interesting is that the number of attempts I had to make before I could actually poop. It all started when I went to my favourite washroom to poop. Upon entering, I saw that the washroom was empty and both stalls were free for me to choose. Of course, I chose the roomy handicapped stall. That particular stall has a really messy flush so the bowl water frequently winds on the seat in the form of random drops. This was the case today but no big deal because you can just wipe off the water before you sit down. I grabbed some of the toilet paper and dried off the seat.

As I was about whip my pleated khakis down, I looked at the toilet paper dispenser and realized both rolls were empty. I had used what little was left to dry off the seat. Actually, it turned out to be a good thing that the seat was wet otherwise I probably woulda done my business and then had at most eight squares left to clean up the crime scene. Anyways, I was annoyed but I was willing to go the stall next to me, even if it was way more cramped. Upon exiting the handicapped stall and entering the other stall I was greeted with an odd sight. On the toilet seat of this stall was a small, wadded up pile of toilet paper. It looked clean. I then looked at the toilet paper dispenser and both rolls were also empty! What the hell! That little pile wasn’t going to cut it.

This was very odd since I know this particular washroom is cleaned and re-stocked at about 10am every day. Since it was not even 1pm at this point, there’s no way all that toilet paper would have been used up in less than three hours. Now I was really miffed. I went up one floor to another washroom because I had no other choice. There, to my amazement, I found that this handicapped stall was also unoccupied. As you might imagine, after I locked the door, I went to check on the toilet paper status. You can guess what I saw. Both rolls empty as well. What the hell was going on? It was clear to me that the cleaning staff had not cleaned and re-stocked the bathrooms today and probably all weekend.

It’s a good thing I really didn’t need to poop that badly because I finally found a stall with toilet paper two stalls down. It was like finding gold. With a secure supply of TP assured, I was finally able to bare my ass and get down to business. After I was done, I was washing my hands when someone came into the washroom and went into the handicapped stall. I really wanted to say something to him but I didn’t know him. By the time I was done with my hesitation, the door had closed and locked, and I could hear the tinkle of his belt buckle. He was getting ready to poop and I did not feel comfortable telling a man I did not know that he was going to have to wipe that up without any toilet paper.

As the shame burned through my body, I could not take it any longer and I quickly left the washroom. I hope that person was able to deal with the situation effectively and with dignity. I truly am sorry I did not speak up when I had the chance. Perhaps someone spared him a square.