News & Updates in August 2008

Posted my review of Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas (2-Disc Collector's Edition & Digital Copy).

Posted my review of Son of Rambow.

Posted my review of John Oliver: Terrifying Times.

Posted my review of The Best of Comedy Central Presents II Uncensored. Posted my review of Chicago 10. Posted my review of Wayside School - Season 1.

Posted the anime profile of Variable Geo Neo Volume II - Fighters Clash.

Posted my review of Dexter - The Second Season.

Posted the character profiles of Cornelia Hale (from W.I.T.C.H.), Masahiro (from Shonen Onmyouji). Posted my review of Transformers: Animated - Season 1. Posted my review of Muhammad Ali: Made in Miami.

Posted my review of South Park - The Complete Eleventh Season. Wow, I haven't posted any personal news since early May! Guess I've been keeping pretty busy. Where do I even start? Well, back in May I was supposed to take my mom's place on a trip to New York with my dad, aunt, and a bunch of other people, but that didn't happen because the airline wouldn't allow us to change the ticket to my name. Then on Memorial Day, Treese and I went to a little BBQ at a friends place, which was a lot of fun. We actually ended up staying the night as neither of us was fit to drive home. I remember waking up once during the night and there was some Roger Corman show on cable about werewolves and vampires and naked chicks....

In June, Treese and I got the Lego Indiana Jones game and had a blast playing that. I don't think it was quite as fun as the Lego Star Wars, but it was still better than a lot of games. On the 13th we went to see the midnight showing of The Incredible Hulk, which was pretty good for the most part. I didn't really feel the romance that they tried to have going on, but the overall story was well done, and the action scenes were fantastic. Infinitely better than the previous movie. On the 22nd we had a major thunderstorm. Thick, bright lightening and deafening claps of thunder were constant. It rained, but not hard, and there were occasional hail storms, even though it was actually pretty warm out. Apparently all the lightning started a bunch of major fires. A couple days later, ash fell from the sky pretty much all day. It was hard to see with the naked eye until it piled up on a car or something. Soon after that, the whole town looked, felt, and smelled extremely smokey, like the entire town wass having a BBQ.

In July, we drove down to Vallejo and visited with family for the July 4th weekend. While there, we went to see Wanted, which Treese liked, but neither my mom nor I thought was all that great. The holiday get together took place at my aunt's house, and there were quite a few people. After the BBQ dinner, we all played this game called Bunco. Most of us never heard of it before, and it is completely luck-based, but still it was enjoyable. At the end of the game, I was actually tied with my mom, so we played a tie-breaker game of which I ended up winning. Since everyone put in money at the beginning, winners got cash rewards, so that was able to help fill up our tank for the drive home.

Then on the 28th, my mom and sister came up to visit. The following day we went to Turtle Bay and did the whole walk across the sundial bridge thing and walk around the garden. After a quick snack outside at the cafe, we went indoors and looked around, then finally got to the main purpose of the trip there, viewing the exhibit of preserved bodies. I love horror movies and slasher flicks, but still this was kind of freaky. The rooms were kept cold, which made me chilly since I had on shorts, sandals, and a short-sleeved t-shirt. Unfortunately, Treese wasn't able to come with us as she had to work, but I suspect that I'll be heading back there sometime this weekend to see it with her.

And now we're into August. On the 4th I was made a member of the phpBB MOD Team, so I had to download and learn about TortoiseSVN. My first task was to update the MODX Tech Specs page. After that, I updated the XSL file that is included with all MODs. On the 7th I attempted an upgrade of the Flash Chat chat system for the forums, and ended up accidentally destroying the database, so I spent most of the next day fixing it from the latest backup. On Tuesday, Treese, Victor, and I went to the midnight showing of Tropic Thunder, which was just as good as the commercials made it out to be, so we were all happy about that. Let's see, what else... oh, Treese has been working on building her Lego Death Star, which looks fairly close to completion. I think she may finish it by this time next week. And I guess that's about it.

Posted my review of Comedy Central's Kenny Vs. Spenny Uncensored - Volume One.

Posted my review of Transformers: Cybertron - The Ultimate Collection.

Posted my review of Drillbit Taylor (Extended Survival Edition).