#dorknotes

[transparentsheepdetective]

Hashtag ideas

Thinking of a colloquial hashtag for my 'original' content

[mcfrontalot]

FPA (Frequently Provided Answers)

No

Yes

Let me get back to you on that

To get to the other side

Three, I think because two of them have to hold the ladder

Sure, why not

We'll play it by ear

Forty-two

Fuck off

That's a decision you're going to have to make for yourself

Uh... I don't know

I said I don't know

If I told you, then I'd have to kill you

You'll find out the hard way

Because I'm not that kind of girl

Your mom

You'll understand these things when you're older

Because I said so

Read the FAQ

Okay, but make sure it's plugged in

Okay, but I don't swallow

You've got to be kidding

Mind your own business

No thanks, I'm trying to cut down

That's not funny

Of course I love you

Too bad

It's very complicated; you wouldn't understand

You don't want to know

What a stupid question

I don't know what you're talking about

I'm so glad you asked

That depends on how you look at it

Only if I have to

If you don't know, I'm not going to tell you

It's all relative

It's all in the wrist

(stunned silence)

(originally posted on 9/24/06 on frontalot.com)

[paperbunnytales]

[transparentsheepdetective]

😊😊😊😊 She always knows just what to say when I'm feeling down, even if she doesn't know it!

[transparentsheepdetective]

Today I learned 6/5/2017

Note to self: Private Tag & Title business may be more expensive, but at least they don’t have lines. Second note to self: MVA is always crowded. No matter what time you go.

[transparentsheepdetective]

Random whale monster that came to me while I was in art class this evening. I'm still alive, btw. Had a rough last few months, though.

[mcfrontalot]

My Mom Is The Awesomest

I've got a song on my 2011 album Solved called Captains Of Industry (recently made into an illegal bootleg mashup called Black And Yellow Tee Shirts by the song's costar MC Lars for his illegal bootleg mashup mixtape) and that song is about how Lars and I are superstars of rap but actually our job is being titans of the clothing industry. In other words, we sell you tee shirts to finance our professional music careers. THERE I JUST EXPLAINED THE AMUSING PART FOR YOU. But you will enjoy the song anyway.

Anyway. My tee shirt dispensary sets up shop in clubs where I make sweaty rap for you folks, and aferwards I am the one who hands you nicely bagged tee shirts at the tagged-up folding table where there isn't enough light.

But did you know?

Those bags were probably prepared by my mom. She is the manager and chief of operations over at Nerdcore HQ West in sunny Berkeley, CA. But do not let the temperate climate and pleasant home office environment fool you. My mom runs a sweat shop over there. Since retiring from a high-powered career in finance, my mom (the sole employee at headquarters) spends her days managing my inventory, negotiating with my suppliers, folding my shirts, drop-shipping to my convention appearances, customer-supporting those of you who hit up my store, packaging my merch before taking it to the post office, and worrying that I (HER SON WHO LIVES IN A DREAM PARADISE WHERE I MAKE ART ALL THE TIME) am not getting enough sleep because I rap too late in the evenings.

I was working on the record during mother's day but I wanted to post this then and for always, since my mom is the awesomest. And also if you are an MC Frontalot fan, her awesomeness benefits you materially.

So let's hear it for Ma Front!

[mcfrontalot]

Guide To Imaginary Compression Formats

.CON Condensation Archive. Relies on slight shifts in the properties of magnetic media due to dampness. Instructs the write head of most hard drives to skip sectors at such a frequency that natural humidity condenses into water droplets on the disc surface. This allows data to be written with an 8% savings in storage space. Not recommended.

.ARF Alternate Reality File. Does not compress; instead causes data to be written to storage media's counterpart in a parallel universe. Local file is a potentially worm-hole inducing version of user's data, brought here from a reality where all the information that has ever existed can be stored within about 3KB. So, some great space savings there.

.HYP HypnoText. Small-footprint app displays swirling colors while flashing contents of text file. Data is stored in user's brain for retrieval upon hearing the trigger word "Kalamazoo!" Compression is variable and occurs when user scrunches up his or her forehead and envisions a tiny little dot getting smaller and smaller.

.TCOMP Trash Compactor. Reduces space needed for items in the Trash/Recycling Bin by an astounding 100%.  TCOMP archives are unfortunately not retrievable.

(originally posted on frontalot.com on 8/18/06)

[mcfrontalot]

Bootleg Review: Final Destination III, double VCD Cam, drinking banana rum

First of all, do not ever produce sequels to things that have “Final” in the title. It shows you to be either dishonest or really terrible at planning.

This is a fairly lousy bootleg. The cam isn’t crooked and doesn’t cut off too much screen, but the picture is dim and the sound is terrible. It’s like someone’s crinkling cellophane right in your ears—both ears—the whole time. You can barely make out any of the dialogue. Luckily, it is not the kind of movie where it matters what the characters are saying.

I am going to be hugely generous and say that this movie follows theEvil Dead II tradition in that it is less a sequel than a remake of its initial installment. If you have never seen Final Destination, you are in the same boat as the lead characters in Final Destination III, although they do not let that get in their way; one of them looks up the plot of that movie on the internet and explains it to the other one. Thus they are well armed for the terrors to come: fate itself is gunning for ten teen-agers who avoided a grisly death in the opening segment. Each will be claimed through an absurd sequence of accidents, prompting the audience to regard every puddle, breeze, or banana peel as potentially murderous. The leads scurry from scene to scene, trying their best to interfere in the Doomed Teen Succession Order, but to little effect. Eventually, the three who survived most of the film are run over by subway trains in the final scene. Or are they?

I think this is not so much a banana rum kind of movie. I recommend instead: Jagermeister shots with a bottomless Miller Genuine Draft chaser. One shot per death (real or premonitory); one sip per visible blood splatter (especially if you’ve just had a shot); one shot per unique nipple (they start about 33 minutes in) and a sip each time each of those nipples returns to screen; one sip per swear word that does not occur within a complete sentence; one sip per line of dialogue in which you think the gothy kid is trying to do Christian Slater from Heathers; one sip per dead pigeon, one shot per “Fuck you, Ben Franklin.”

Statistical Analysis: Number of jokes in movie: 4 (the audience chuckles at each) Number of heads that explode: at least 2 really explicitly, maybe others Number of characters introduced in the last scene as if they were about to start a whole ‘nother Final Destination movie before this one’s even over: 2

[mcfrontalot]

Servings of Whoop-Ass, and how to Threaten to Dispense Them

I'm going to decant a half carafe of whoop-ass on you.

First I'll sprinkle salt on your hand, then I'll pour you a shot of tequila, then you get to suck on a fresh wedge of whoop-ass.

Don't make me take the rubber band off this bundle of organic whoop-ass.

It says there are eight to ten servings of whoop-ass in here but that is ridiculous and I'm just going to dump the whole jar out for you.

I am prepared to foam you up a hot mug of whoop-ass.

I will squeeze for you the last of the whoop-ass, even if I have to roll the whole tube tightly from the flat end.

I'm fixing to dab a droplet of whoop-ass behind your ear.

You're calling for a level tablespoon of finely minced whoop-ass but I think I can eyeball it.

I'm defrosting you that whole Costco bag of whoop-ass.

Here comes two quick puffs from the whoop-ass inhaler.

I'm about to cut you a fat rail of whoop-ass. Have you got a CD case or something?

[originally posted to frontalot.com 4.6.2006]

[mcfrontalot]

Top Five Nerdiest Moments in Hip-Hop

Sept. 24, 1991: Tribe Called Quest's Low End Theory comes out. While essentially an album for incredibly cool people, it includes the dorkiest moment in hip-hop to date: a 19-year-old Busta Rhymes growling "RRRRRROAW RRRRRRROAW like a dungeon dragon / Change your little drawers cause your pants are saggin'."

Sept. 2, 1995:I Wish by Skee-Lo hits No. 53 on the Billboard 200, propelled by its title single, a rap about having bad coordination and being short. Includes the immortal lines "Dag, y'all! I never understood / Why the jocks get the fly girls / And me, I get the hood rats . . . "

Oct. 31, 1997: Video game PaRappa the Rapper released in the U.S. PlayStations across the country run hot with youngsters' attempts to beat the All Masters' Bathroom Rap Battle level.

May 23, 2000: Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Kid Koala and Dan the Automator team up for their sci-fi hip-hop epic Deltron 3030. They would later gain favor with the cool-kid audience with the first Gorillaz album, but this original Deltron CD is the ultimate in high-profile nerd rap.

April 30, 2002: Blackalicious releases Blazing Arrow, which includes the track Chemical Calisthenics. A sequel-in- spirit to their famousAlphabet Aerobics, this one overloads the geek-o-meter with lines like "C-A-O-H-2 wine water solution of calcium hydroxide / Slobbin it, C-A-O lime will make bleach powder / Galvanic metal beats stomp out louder."

[Originally published in the Rocky Mountain News, Colorado, Nov 16, 2007]

[mcfrontalot]

How to GM Your Own Habit Abatement Campaign

I don't like to talk about Quitting Smoking. It sounds so final, and it turns the inevitable backslide into a major failure event. But I do Stop Smoking from time to time, which lasts anywhere from a few weeks to three years. I am in process of stopping right now, in fact. Usually I stop by not smoking, which is a pretty okay way to do it. This time I'm trying to make it more interesting by gradually diminishing intake with the help of a couple D&D rules.

You can play too! Here's how.

1. Name your character. Mine's Breathorr Inflatagon, a level 2 Lung Elf. You don't have to roll up stats. If you're a real stickler for form, go get your lungs x-rayed. The x-ray film is your character sheet.

2. Keep a d20 in your pack of cigarettes. If it doesn't fit, keep die, lighter, and pack together in some kind of totable container. May I suggest a pouch?

3. Whenever you feel like smoking, that means the GM (you) is trying to poison your character (also you). Time for a saving throw! I decided the DC (Difficulty Class) for my save vs Poison is 15. Roll the d20. 15 and up: I am saved from that cigarette I wanted! Hooray? 14 and under: oh darn, I get to enjoy another satisfying and flavorful cancer treat.

4. If you make the save, you really can't have a cigarette. Rolls have to be at least an hour apart. If you haven't rolled for two hours, that does not mean you get to roll twice. Be strict, or the GM Regulatory Cabal will revoke your authority. (I assume? I haven't GM'd since like 1988.)

5. Every day of the campaign, your Wisdom increases slightly. You're using Will to save against Poison, so increased Wis modifies in your favor (well, in your character's favor — your GM prefers that the poison attacks land). I'm using a mod of +1 for each day, so on day two rolls of 14 and up are successful saves, on day three it's 13 and up, etc. Fifteen days into the campaign, I will only be allowed to smoke when I roll a natural 1.

6. Rolling a natural 1, of course, is a critical fail. Thus, no matter how wise I get, I will always be able to sneak a cigarette if I can roll a 1. But after fifteen days I'm going to limit myself to one poisoning attempt per day, instead of one per waking hour. The game logic behind this is: fuck you, I do what I want.

You can design your own system, of course. The DC of 15 and the minimum hour between rolls seemed suited to how much I was already smoking. If you go through two packs of Chesterfields a day you are probably not going to survive on so meager an allotment of poison.

I realize also that this system is nowhere near complicated enough for some gamers. Feel free to adapt much more sophisticated rulesets. Probably "internet" would be a good place to post them once you've got the kinks worked out.

[originally posted to frontalot.com 4.13.2009]

[mcfrontalot]

The Pure And Simple Laundry Commission

The Pure and Simple Laundry Commission convened in August of 1989. As a special investigative taskforce, it was empowered by congress to root out the corruption and intrigue that had been, for several decades, threatening the nation’s laundering industry. Helming the Pure and Simple Laundry Commission were Terrence Pure, a public attorney from Iowa whose crusade against rat hair in milk inhabited headlines, and Joseph Simple, the architect of the United Nations’ thirty-six-year plan to bring bleach to the developing world. Their surnames, which they jointly lent to their commission, instilled in the public a sense of great relief. How could a commission so named, evoking as it did at mere mention the finest and most trustworthy aspects of laundry itself, fail to succeed in its appointment?

The only lasting visible effect of the commission’s work is a regulation which applies to consumer detergents marked “concentrated” (they must bear indication of a “regular” detergent’s equivalent cleansing power, expressed as a ratio of scoops or capfuls).  The continuing and hidden effects of the commission’s findings are the stuff of wild speculation. These facts are known:

1. The commission was by 1993 no longer directly answerable to the congress. Its power to assemble a Grand Jury and issue subpoena expired in June of that year.

2. The commission expanded its offices three months later, taking over the entire sixth floor of the Demarcey Plaza. Technicians refitted that floor’s windows with steel plates and management replaced the entire building’s security detail. Operating without officially channeled funds, the commission’s continuance raised eyebrows in several marginal publications but was not addressed by the national media.

3. By 1997, no other entity listed its address at the Demarcey Plaza. Steel plates shined cleanly behind every pane.

4. Bertrand “Suds” Purcell, owner and CEO of PurcellUniChem, disappeared early in 2001 while en route to his scheduled keynote address at the Annual Convention of the International Association of Dry Cleaning Compound Manufacturers. His wife and assumed widow Rose stated publicly that her husband had suffered abduction. She insisted that agents of the P&S were in close contact with him for several weeks leading up to his disappearance. She described his anxiety surrounding these encounters as acute.

5. By mid-2002, six more prominent manufacturers of soaps, solvents, and softeners had vanished under mysterious circumstances.

6. In January of 2003, a senate subcommittee called for an investigation to result in a full accounting of the Pure and Simple Laundry Commission’s persisting operations. The Demarcey Plaza building was discovered to be empty, its walls bare, its floors spotless.

(originally posted on frontalot.com on 7/1/06)

[mcfrontalot]

Open Letter No. 419

Here is an advance fee fraud email that earlier today snuck through my tight scrum of anti-spam robots. That's right I SAID I HAVE A TIGHT SCRUM. Because I need a break from listening to drum loops, I am going to reply to every line in the email, and then go drink some orange juice.

APPROVED ON YOUR BEHALF.

This is a good headline! I hate approving things and I feel like someone is going to save me lots of hard work.

Urgent Attention For Your Benefit.

Whoever I'm hearing from feels a sense of urgency about doing things that might benefit me! I am 100% interested in reading the rest of this email.

From the office the Presidency Mr. Louis Daniel Goodluck.

Okay, that sounds like a stage name. But I understand that politics (even the politics of the office of the bank president) is a lot like show business, so I will take you as an ambitious climber and call you Mr. Goodluck without winking at you behind my hat. Attn; Fund Recipients I am written to inform you that your files appeared on our desk to pay you a partial payment of 8 million dollars  at of your fund  for this first quarter of the year.

You are written. So, okay. You are not a banking sub-executive with a stage name so much as you are a character in a drama. ME TOO!! My character is called MC Frontalot and I live in a wonderful fantasy world where I get to be a rapper all day long. I think your email found me for a reason, and I really want to be friends. As a friend, I'm curious about YOUR fantasy job! Can we discuss these files that you process, and the funds these files are associated with? I mean, I just found out that I am getting copied on Fund Recipients memos now, and already my very own fund is owed eight million dollars? The partialness of which hints at completion funds to follow?

But we are having misunderstanding because one Mr. Cole Wanda called of yesterday that he is your new next of kin that you instructed him to receive the fund on your favour that you are totally sick and you can not work or answer any calls.

Mr. Goodluck, I am shocked and disheartened. We have met only two paragraphs ago and misunderstanding already threatens to derail our friendship. This is drama indeed. First of all, your Mr. Cole Wanda sounds to me like a charlatan. I feel strongly that if all of my blood relations had passed away at some point yesterday, I would have heard about it. So even if Mr. Cole Wanda is some distant familial relation of mine, perhaps the groom of a cousin's step-sister, there's pretty much no way that he's legitimately my next of kin. I think that he is 'putting you on' in hopes of getting one of his own funds funded. I don't want to slander the guy, and I realize there's some chance that I have him all wrong. Still, I urge you to treat his claims with skepticism. For example: I am getting over a mild sniffle, but by no means have I been 'totally sick.'

but we were so confuse that is why the authority instructed me to contact you for us to know if he is telling us the truth or not.

But here's the very issue. How can you know if I'm the one telling the truth? What if I were the weasel in the hedges, so to speak -- casting doubt on Mr. Cole Wanda from the safety of my soon-to-ripen fund and depriving that good, honest man of my kinship? My character has so few signifiers at this point. Perhaps in asking me to vouch for Mr. Cole Wanda, the authority has played right into my hands. And might my motives take on even darker shades? What if the eight million is nothing to me, merely a toe-hold as I set in motion my plan to take the bank for everything it's worth? My dear Mr. Goodluck, you must not be overanxious in trusting any -- any! -- of the players in this little scenario. There is simply too much at stake.

He even forwarded this bank details to us. Bank Name:  Credit Union Na Account Name: Mr. Cole Wanda. Account number: 908374912 Swift code: cwd1u  

I understand that Mr. Cole Wanda is a trusting soul. He shared his bank details with you and did not think twice. This points to a man of high moral rectitude. Or perhaps a confidence artist at the end of his rope! A man so desperate to get between me and my fund(s) that he has, in a risky move, forwarded you his most private banking information, knowing, as he must have known, that you were likely to publish it in a memo going out to all Fund Recipients.

After he provided this account to us, he instructed us not to inform you and we should transfer the fund into his account directly because he is your next of kin. Please kindly check this account and this name and tell us if you know him and for you to informed  us ,if we should go ahead and transfer the fund into his account or not.

I sympathize with you. A lot of files must cross your desk every day, and this one presents a genuine conundrum. On the one hand, Mr. Cole Wanda, someone who is gravely concerned with the health and solvency of even his most distant relatives. On the other, MC Frontalot, a man who has an email account. I appreciate how this riddle must be torturing you, both professionally and personally. I find that I cannot answer it for you. Take one deep breath, look into your heart, and choose. We wait to hear from you soon. Don't keep us waiting for your own good.

Mr. Goodluck! I assure you that I would never inconvenience you in service of my own good. If my reply is in any way tardy, please ascribe it to the fact that I did not write back to you but instead posted your email with inline commentary on my website.

Thanks and God bless. Regards, Mr. Louis Daniel Goodluck. Special Adviser to Mr. President

Mr. President has had some 'good luck' in getting you on the team, my friend!  All the best in future, warmest regards, etc. MC Frontalot

[originally posted to frontalot.com 1.9.2011]

[mcfrontalot]

Games You Should Play and Movies You Should Watch Immediately Beforehand

Shadow of the Colossus (PS2) SotC is the most beautifully staged and absorbing console game I’ve ever seen. I get lost in it the way I do in certain books, which is strange because this game’s got almost no plot. You (whoever you are) bring your dead elf girlfriend to the resurrect-o-slab in a scary old temple where the voice of the darkness tells you to seek out and defeat a series of colossi. So you do the seeking and the defeating. You have a horse and a magic sword. Actually, the sword seems pretty normal, but it has a magic shininess that is vital to your pursuits. That’s pretty much it. Yet, in playing out, it shows you things about scale, distance, and physicality that you never imagined you would see on a PS2. I am kind of thinking about getting a PS3 just so I can replay this game with a better frame rate.

Time Bandits (1981) It has almost nothing to do with SotC, but it is the 3rd-awesomest Terry Gilliam movie (after Brazil and Holy Grail, duh), so you should watch it as often as possible. And when the sea giant rises from the water wearing the Ogre’s boat as a hat, and someone stabs him in hismagical weak spot, you are primed to do a couple of SotC fights right then and there.

    Psychonauts (PC, Xbox, etc) This is a 3-D platformer towering miles above the rest of the genre; it’s got the funniest writing and best voice acting of the millennium so far (you’ll maybe recognize the Old Man Murray crew on dialogue and Invader Zim as the protagonist Rez). It handles well and has genuinely stylish scene & character design. And all of a sudden you can get it on Steam for twenty bucks, so do. I desperately want for this studio to make another game.

  Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind ESotSM is one of my favorite movies, and the only performance I’ve ever really liked from America’s beloved rubber-faced fartsmith. I sometimes rant about how every movie should be about a character making a single decision (see Spy Game, Hero, Citizen Ruth, Memento, Jacob’s Ladder, et al). Eternal Sunshine is the most original and the most touching of the various implementations of this structure. Again, it doesn’t have much to do with the game except that in both cases most of the action takes place in the shifting landscapes of the subconscious. And after the darker laughs and yanketty heartstrings of ESotSM you’re going to want to lighten up for a few hours by hunting figments and cobwebs and brains in jars.

  The Lost Treasures of Infocom (PC/Mac) Okay, there is a lot worth playing in this gang of 80s text adventures, but really I’m talking about the all-time greatest text adventure HHG2tG. I learned to touch-type because I had to talk to this game in complete sentences. And I learned to love arbitrarily complex logic problems when it was time to get the Babel Fish to go in my ear. If you’re a collector, this game is on the Lost Treasures I and Sci-Fi collections from Infocom, outrageously priced in the used bin at Amazon Marketplace. Otherwise just play it free at the BBC site.

  Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy (1982 BBC series on DVD) You have several options for getting psyched up towards the whole bunch of typing that is the HHG2tG text adventure. The recent Hollywood movie was quite solid (mostly because of Sam Rockwell and Mos Def) and the novel or original radio series share the honors for hilarity and pacing. But the BBC TV version still has my favorite Arthur Dent. Revisit it.

    Dead Rising (360) Man, I wish this would come out on PC. I only got to play for a couple hours at Penny Arcade Expo ’06. I am hooked. You can beat zombies to death (I mean, to moredeath) with anything that you can lift or roll. And finallythere is a big enough crowd of zombies in a video game for me to actually feel like I am going to get eaten.

  Dead Alive (1992) Sure, Dead Rising is a straight rip of Dawn Of The Dead, and you won’t go wrong with Romero’s politically engaging original or the surprisingly good 2004 remake. But no zombie movie holds a candle to Peter Jackson’s Dead Alive, which will juice you up to boot the 360 and sluice the lumbering undead with the lawn mower.

    Legend of Zelda: the Wind Waker (GC) I never had a Nintendo, but my housemate had a GameCube and let me play his copy of Wind Waker for about a month straight while I had a broken leg. There are not that many games that you can explore for a month straight and still feel like you haven’t seen everything. I guess all you people who had a lot of Nintendos over the years would put all the Zelda games in that category. But I saw those games. They were stupid-looking. Wind Waker is awesome-looking. This is the best-ever place to be wandering around doing idiotic quests, collecting walnuts, herding orphans, stabbing flowers, whatever the hell it is you’re supposed to do to get your triforce back together and kill Gargamel or whoever. Plus you can use your pan-flute to make the weather do your bidding and you have a talking boat.

  The Dark Crystal (1982) Jim Henson’s muppetless puppet movie is slow as molasses, yet still weirdly exciting. Just like Zelda! And though there’s nothing as frightening in Wind Waker as the Skeksis, and no talking boats in Dark Crystal (dammit!) you will notice that both properties center on pointy-eared midget creatures with heads shaped like almonds.

    Prince of Persia: Sands of Time (PC, PS2, Xbox, GC) I played the hell out of the old(est) PoP and felt my blood race when it was time to go through a vertical chomper or fight the vizier. That original king of the VGA platform scramblers stands as a classic. Find some abandonwarezy DOS version instead of playing the weirdly unsatisfying flash port. Better yet, get a C64 emu and go back to Mechner’s first hit, Karateka. Before you do any of that, though, check out the first PS2 game that really convinced me console gaming was awesome. PoP:SoT has the best gameplay and level design of the modern PoP trilogy. It feels vast and complex, looks beautiful, and balances fighting with trying-to-figure-out-how-the-hell-to-get-up-there better than anything since Tomb Raider II. Oh, and before you play Sands of Time, watch:

  Back To The Future (1985) The movie that made us forgive Michael J Fox for embodying that jackass Alex P Keaton. Much like our buddy The Prince (of Persia), Michael’s Marty learns early in his adventure that you can beat any level if you have the power to go back in time for unlimited do-overs. Wait, no, that’s the plot of Part II. BttF1 is about Marty trying to get his parents to have sex. That’s gross. Except people think I look like Crispin Glover. So trying to get him to have sex with someone is awesome. Or sort of gross/awesome. Curses! I do not know how to feel about this movie any more.

    Katamari Damacy (PS2) The first totally new idea for a game that I’ve seen since the mid-90s. If you are into video games, you probably already know about this one. But if you hate video games (and are reading this anyway), listen up. You control a ball of sticky garbage. Last night your abusive dad The King of All Cosmos got drunk and destroyed every star in the firmament. You have to roll your sticky garbage ball around and pick up everything you roll over. The ball gets bigger and bigger, until it is big enough to turn into a new star in the sky. That’s the whole game. Weirdest intro movie ever. Best in-game music ever. Lends major credence to the notion that Japanese people are insane. A must-play. By the way, the sequel We Heart Katamari has more interesting levels but lacks the first game’s cohesive progression – in Damacy you get steadily bigger as you go from picking up matches and thumbtacks to absorbing whole continents.

  James and the Giant Peach (1996) Actually you should not watch this movie. Aside from some charming animation, it was pretty lame. Read the Dahl book instead. It will get you in the mood for rotation-propelled forward-aiming unstopability.

NOTE: I got solicited by Amazon to write this but then I never got it together to give it to the right person over there. So now it’s here, with all the product links sending you to Amazon via my associate code. So buy things at amazon with those links. And I will in turn buy a giant mansion in the fashionable north-eastern foothills of my imagination.

[originally posted to frontalot.com 7.20.2007]

[mcfrontalot]

Bootleg Review: Capsules Galore 1

Here's a roundup of all the bootlegs that the Torrentator has been looking at lately.

Evan Almighty, average quality cam, xvid It is almost impossible to believe that they spent two hundred million dollars on this senseless and cloying poo festival. Watch for the eight times when the bootlegger's coat comes down over the camcorder lens just in time to miss a visual gag.

The domestic version of The Office, all three seasons so far, HD captures, divx The Office (UK) is one of the most wonderful things ever. But it is gone. Once you stop hating this version just because it isn't the real version, you can open your heart to its many charms. Only bad thing to say about it is that Steve Carell's hilariousness might cause you to think that downloading Evan Almighty is a good idea.

40 Year Old Virgin, "unrated" version, DVD rip divx Do not watch the unrated version. It has an extra fifteen minutes that pretty much destroys the pacing of the best comedy movie since forever ago. Time management warning: watching Steve Carell in this will probably make you go and download 12 GB worth of The Office.

Freaks & Geeks and Undeclared, one season each, mostly on Stage6 and Veoh After you get home from seeing Knocked Up in a theater, but before you watch 40 Year Old Virgin again, you'll get curious about what the whole cast of those movies were like when they were playing a bunch of 18-year-olds eight years ago. Answer: they were like pretty funny. And kind of touching from time to time. Judd Apatow seems to be some kind of genius. Check him out flame-warring That 70's Show fauxteur Mike Brazil, circa Undeclared.

Rome, first season DVD rip divx set, second season piecemeal from tv-links.co.uk Sort of a cross between Deadwood and Desperate Housewives, set during the decline of the Roman empire. Every episode has some humping, plenty of stabbing, and just enough classical history to make you look up the subject matter on wikipedia. Look out, though. Wiki gots spoilers. Also look out for the wrong-ass aspect ratios on the S02 eps on tv-links. Better to get a whole-season torrent, unless you're on one of the ISPs that likes to tell HBO who you are. Like SBC Global. Fuck those guys.

Hardware 1990 Uncut Red Edition PAL DVDrip.avi Basically a terminator ripoff, but it was about a million times seedier, more drug-addled, and British. Lemmy drives the post-apocalyptic moto-gondola. This German (English-language) supposed DVD rip looks a lot like a VHS capture. But it's all we get. Enjoy.

(originally appeared on frontalot.com on 6/26/07)