Summer Movie Season

Well, the summer movie season is upon us.  

This week was Wolverine.  Was pretty good, I'm not that into the X-men stuffs.  I have seen the movies, but never really followed the comics.  But I did enjoy the movie.

Next week is Star Trek

I have been getting more and more into Star Trek and so I have been looking foward to this.  Its a little disturbing that they are very much pushing "Forget everything you know" and "Not your father's Star Trek".  So hopefully they don't muck up things too much.

Week after Angels & Demons

Looks to be interesting.  DaVinci code was good.  

Following week: Termination Salvation

More Terminator, recently we watched the 3 movies that are out last weekend.  Plus while on TDY I watched season 1 of the Sarah Connor Chronicals.  So I am looking foward to this one.

Also that week: Night at the Museum 2

Looks funny, should be a good one to catch.

And the last week of May: UP

Gonna go see this one with the Troop, so it will be a different set up then the other movies for this summer.

Then the next June: Transformers 2

Not that I am really into Transformers.  However a good chunk of it was filmed out here.  So it should be interesting to watch for that.

Onto July: Public Enemies

Mob Movie about Dillinger.  Johnny Depth and Christian Bale.  Haven't heard much about it, but could be interesting.

That week is Dawn of the Dinosaurs

Part 3 of the Ice Age movies, been a while since the last one, but looks to be a fun one.

The following week: Hurt Locker

Limited release, its about a bomb squad in Baghdad.  Looking into more, since this is the first I've heard it I may have to do research.

And the next week: Harry Potter

I've seen the others, so I suppose I will go to see this one too.

And into August: GI JOE

Real American Hero!  And now you know... and knowing is half the battle.

Skip a week: Inglorious Basterds

Waiting till it comes out on DVD.  But could be interesting.  

And that should just about finish out the Summer Movie season.

Terminator and Time Travel

So in the first Terminator movie a Terminator and a human travel from 2029 to 1984, one to protect Sarah Connor and one to kill her.  At this point Judgement Day (nuclear holocaust that wipes out most of human life) is set for August 29, 1997. Now, since Sarah lives and John is born this still is the case. Now it would get tricky if the terminator had killed Sarah.  At that point John would never be born and then wouldn't lead the resistance, but then the terminator wouldn't jump back through time, meaning Sarah would be alive and so would John.... Oh then you have the thought that Kyle (from the future) is John's dad.  He doesn't know that, John will learn of it, but still, might be why John sends Kyle back when John gets to that point in life. Also the terminator's remains are found by Cyberdyne to first make the terminator. No problems here, so we will move on.

Terminator 2.  Judgement Day is still set for 1997.  But more terminators come back from 2029.  Here is the first problem.  Only living tissue can travel back in time, so the terminators can travel since they are living tissue over a metal endoskeleton.  But the new terminator is mimetic polyalloy; which is liquid metal, which by the established laws for time travel we know can not work.   Now then, they manage to destroy Cyberdyne's research and in doing so they can stop Judgement day.  Now here is where we run into problems. Upon destruction of the research if Judgement Day had been stopped the terminators should have immediately disappeared.  Now if Judgement Day had not been stopped an only moved back, the Terminator should know immediately.  We don't find out until the next movie....

Terminator 3.  Again, terminators from the future, this time they follow the rules for time travel, things are good.  We learn that Judgement Day has only been pushed  back, now until July 25, 2004.  Sarah Connor has finally died, and John is on his own.  We learn John dies in 2032, by a Terminator and his wife sent it back to guard him.  At the end of the movie we find out that Judgement Day happens, though John and his future wife are safe in a bunker.

Sarah Connor Chronicles.  Now we go back to 1999 and a terminator comes to protect John  and Sarah and jumps them to 2007.  We have clearly left the 3 movie and changed random things. I've read some things that say this is an alternate reality or perhaps and alternate timeline.  Now with all of the time traveling anyone who has seen Back to the Future will know that many alternate timelines exist.  So we can let this go.

The big problems come from T2.  How can a liquid metal that can take the shape and appearance of things pass back in time when we have been told that only living tissue can pass through time?  Shouldn't the T-101 have mentioned, by the way you didn't stop judgement day?  And then why did it have to destroy itself, since by the fact that it still existed clearly the technology is made and it could have stuck around to protect John. 

Ain't time travel fun?

Digital Transition

Are you confused about the Digital Transition?  Probably not.  Or you weren't but thanks to the Government we have taken care of that.

In 2005 Congress decided to switch from analog broadcast to digital, not cause it has better picture, but cause we wanna use the spectrum for other things.  It turns out, despite the beliefs of at least 1 person I know, we can not actually just make more frequencies.  So in 2005 there was a date set, 17 Feb 09.  On that date TV stations would have to switch to digital broadcast.  

You probably new it was happening.  There have been commericals on for quite some time now.  If you didn't know, you probably don't watch TV in which case you will be unaffected.  In early 2008 the government started this whole coupon thing so they would help you pay for a converter box.  Of course, being a government program it got backed up and bogged down.  So apparently there are some people that didn't get their coupon. Some people are just putting it off.  

But back to this switch business, full power stations are switching, so if you watch a full power station you need to do something to ensure you can get the digital signal.  If you watch a low power station or a community station or a booster station they will still broadcast.  If you have cable or satellite, you probably don't have to do anything.  If you have a new tv, you don't have to do anything.

Here is where the government steps in to save us from.... the government.  In order to let the last few people who haven't gotten around to getting ready yet the government came up with a plan to push back the date.  The senate ok-ed it, the house voted it down, then later changed their mind and ok-ed it as well.  So the president will sign it and it will become law.

Stay with me here....   The orginal date was 17 Feb 09.  All the commericals currently on TV say its coming 17 Feb 09.  The countdown clocks in stores are counting down to 17 Feb 09.  Now the date will be sometime between 14 Mar and 12 Jun.  Though some stations may switch on 17 Feb, or earlier.  So the government can just choose a new date, and then when people aren't ready they can push that one back too.

I say stick the 17 Feb 09 date.  If people aren't ready or haven't gotten the equipment as soon as they release they don't get tv on 18 Feb they will run out and buy new TVs and pay extra to have them installed for prime time viewing on 18 Feb.  

Computer Sounds

So then.. we'll start off with the good news.  The desktop has returned and it is once again set up.  Looks like I'll just be running a single screen on it, but I'm ok with that.  Its funny though, when I turn on my two external hard drives it thinks that I have 4 hard drives on there.  Still can't get the webcam functioning, but I haven't really played with it that much.  As it turns out there was a motherboard failure.  So that is all fixed up.  

Now both of my computers run vista.  So it looks like I will not be playing Monkey Island for a time.  However I think that I am gonna play with the laptop and get Civ IV on there.  Then I will have some fun playing that.  Hooray Civ!

As the title says this is a long way to get to talking about computer sounds.  Well, as you may know, my laptop says "I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that" when it shuts down.  Now with the desktop I've moved to more sounds.  Now that is the quote if you log off.  Now if you shut down windows Spock will say "Illogical"  or if you empty the recycle bin you will hear a tribble.  When you log on Scotty says "Hello computer".  Now I don't have to greet the computer every time.  So yes, I have had some fun with this.  

Couple Things

So then... it seems that there is a new best selling video game of all time.  For the longest time it was Super Mario Brothers on the NES.  Now I will point out that this is based on number of games sold, not amount of money made.  GTA IV made something like $500 million its first week and sold something along the lines of 8.5 million games.  Now, the orginial Super Mario Brothers sold approximately 40 million games.  

But now the title of best selling video game of all time belongs to Wii Sports.  It has sold 40.24 million copies.  Now yes, most of them are because unless you are in Japan or South Korea the game comes with the console so you don't have to go out and buy it. But that was true for Super Mario Brothers atleast for a while.  

Now, lets take a look and the top 10 Best Selling Video Games worldwide:

1.Wii Sports (Wii)

2. Super Mario Brothers (NES)

3. Pokemon: Red, Green, Blue (GB)

4. Tetris (GB)

5. Duck Hunt (NES)

6. Pokemon: Gold/Silver (GB)

7. Nintendogs (GB)

8. Super Mario World (SNES)

9. Wii Play (Wii)

10. Super Mario Land (GB)

Now, I have to say, congrats to Nintendo as they control the list of best selling games, but then again they kind of re-invented the home gaming system world wide. And for fun here are the top sellers on some other consoles:

Atari 2600: Pac-Man (7 million sold)

Xbox: Halo 2 (8 million sold)

Xbox 360: Halo 3 (8.1 million sold)

Sega Genisis: Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (6 million sold)

Playstation: Gran Turismo (10.85 million sold)

PS2: Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (12 million sold)

PS3: Metal Gear Solid 4 (4.33 million sold)

Moving on, why does everyone want to push back the digital transition day?  Congress mandated it in 2005. And right now according to the Washington Post 6.8 percent of the 114 million homes that use over the air broadcast aren't ready.  Now consider the number of people that live in this country and then consider who isn't reay.  And its not cause they don't know, its cause they are lazy.  Pushing the date back will merely help them put it off longer.  Switch it on Feb 17 and Feb 18 they will help the economy by running out and buying the converter box or a new tv.