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If you're ever in town you'll have to let me know. Even my stuck up Yankees fan brother (I'm a Yanks fan, but not stuck up) conceded that Safeco is actually great.

Seeing your boys tonight Norm. Sucks I don't get to see Cabrera though.

To your point about language, I will say, mistakes are certainly annoying and easily avoidable in a professional setting, that's absolutely correct, but even "internet speak," as much as I would advise not using it in your resume, is it's own language. Language is ever evolving, even if that language consists of emojis and acronyms, it's still a method of communicating that most of us whove spent time on the internet understand, no matter how childish it may look. Obviously, all of us here are very adept at putting our thoughts into actual words, but I dont think those who choose not to when on the web should be looked down upon (not that I think that's what you're doing).

When I was growing up, we yearned to learn about the past generations, now?

I may have to admit, part of the reason I started this was to try to get stories from you and others here who have, uh, preceded me in existence on this Earth, heh.

Ive heard my father's stories, but obviously those are specific to an Italian kid growing up on Long Island. I feel confident the experiences and anecdotes and upbringing of our members here probably are not 100% the same, and diverge more the further we get in your timeline.

I'll jump on this grenade with you Rigg.

In no particular order:

1. Phantasm - Years ago my buddy and I did a 24 hour horror movie marathon (I posted about it on BSB!) and that was the first time I saw this movie. This is easily the best, and scariest, although I love the following three sequels (I need to see the fifth still).

2. Halloween - I mean, come on. The original, with Michael Myers. Calling it a classic isn't enough, but this movie is still pretty terrifying.

3. Cabin in the Woods - And then we'll take the piss right out of all horror movies, except this one has an ending that tops them all, perhaps.

4. In the Mouth of Madness - Also a Carpenter flick (and part of what's referred to as his Prince of Darkness trilogy, which somehow includes this, Prince of Darkness and The Thing?). Starring Sam Neill, it concerns an author who's basically Stephen King (watch this movie and the thing you remember most might be the question "DO YOU READ SUTTER KANE"). It's Lovecraftian, it's expertly crafted, and it's horrifying. I hate horror movies that where reality shifts constantly because that's one of those things that just scares the heck out of me. This has it in spades. So good.

5. The Descent - Before this recent new wave of modern horror, The Descent was probably the only film in the 2000s that was really a great horror flick. Concerning a group of women spelunking, the fear is generated as much by the unnatural things they find as it is the natural ones (i.e., you know, being trapped in a cave). Also an excellent one with a mind screw of an ending. Never saw the sequel.

[Day 30]

Day 30

WE MADE IT! I know this one got off to a rocky start with the best/worst template I couldn't seem to escape, but I think we finished strong here. As usual, feel free to just talk about whatever videogame(s) you want to here.

I didn't really get a chance to bring it up before, but allow me to use this time to praise Overcooked.

I saw, I think, one of the screenwriters I follow on Twitter raving about this game during the PSN holiday sale and after looking at it I trusted enough that it would be fun and is it ever!

This game definitely is more of a multiplayer game (Tider, you and the whole family would absolutely love it, I feel confident in saying) although it can be played single player as well (although that would be so much more difficult). At it's most basic, it's a game where you're a chef and you're cooking food to order. But it's so much more than that.

The thing I like most about it for me, is my girlfriend and I play it often, and to be truly efficient with your cooking and time management your communication has to be SPOT ON (well, if you want to get 3 stars on a level, anyway). We'd actually taken a break for a bit for one reason or another (*cough* MLB 18 *cough*) but yesterday we picked it back up and after about an hour or maybe hour and a half had completed two more levels at 3 stars (we'll usually move on with just 2 stars, but one time we were only 4 points from 3 stars and another time we were about 12 points and 3 seconds away from 3 stars, so we kept playing the same two levels). It's highly addicting.

Seriously, it's a great party game if you have 4 controllers, if you have 2 it's still a great team game and like I said, even for one person I can still see this as being highly addicting and competitive. Do yourself a favor, the next PSN digital sale, take a look to see if this (and it's seasonal add-ons) is one of the games on sale, and then buy it. You won't regret it.

[Day 29 - A Game You Intended to Buy, But Didn't]

Day 29 - A Game You Intended to Buy, But Didn't

Only one that really sticks out in my mind is L.A. Noire. Had planned to buy it for PS3 but never got around to it...then thought about purchasing it when the remastered edition for PS4 came out.

Still hasn't happened.

Same.

An ex of mine had it. It was...not great.

as for not friends for a game night you guys could start getting a few games and start playing amongst yourselves and as you get friends you can weave them in.

Yeah, we got Kingdomino but it plays so quick it's hard to really get into. We also got Pandemic Cthulhu but after reading the rule book for what felt like 5 hours we...kind of gave up.

And obviously games like Taboo or Cards Against Humanity we can't really play with just the two of us (I debate with myself about having kiddo play that when he's here but even though he's an incredibly smart and mature 12 year old I'm not sure he's ready for some of those cards, even despite seeing movies like Deadpool).

Get massive darkness or zombicide. Those would be age appropriate and fun for all 3 and, the 2 of you could play. Massive Darkness is basically the board game version of Diablo. It scales up to 6 players I think.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXGKpZMTJik

I don't think it'll change your response but I should say, when I say "we," I mean my fiance and I. We haven't attempted to play Pandemic with kiddo, which, we should, because he's smarter than both of us and could probably teach us to play after five minutes, haha (alright, maybe not 5 minutes, but still).

I will definitely look into both of those suggestions though.

[Day 29 - A Game You Intended To Buy, But Didn't]

Day 29 - A Game You Intended To Buy, But Didn't

God of war 3. I had bought 1 and 2 on ps2, bought the PSP versions and then bought the compilations of the previous versions for PS3, when it finally came out, I was like meh.... I havent finished the PSP versions and never got around to buying it.

I did the same thing!!!! For a time.

I got the first two on PS2 when they had a collector's pack. I had planned to get 3 on PS3, but just never did. Then it went on sale for digital download on PS4 for like, $5 or something I think xmas 2016 or so, something like that, and I finally downloaded it and played through.

Taking the same tactic with the newest God of War. Give it a year or two and see what the price is then.

You know, growing up in the 90s feels completely different. I saw once on Twitter or somewhere, and obviously the science behind this can be debated, but that kids from my generation became so used to technological progress, we went from cassettes, to CDs, to MP3s to streaming. We went from MSDOS to Windows and the internet and eventually smart phones and tablets, all within about 20 years, so that we've always been stuck in this state of transition between resources. VHS to DVD to blu-ray to streaming too. Obviously, the video games too have progressed incredibly in just 20 years, which, while the jump from PS3 to PS4 was actually noticeable, it wasn't as big a jump as previous console iterations (and why game companies are looking to VR to save them).

So it's always funny to me to look back at times because they were there, but so shortly. Whereas someone like my dad, who can certainly appreciate the transition, actually got to spend considerable time in the "before" (and, presumably, will for the "after" too), I'm going to spend more of my life with this technology (and who knows what else) than I did without. And, really, the internet is still in its infancy and who knows if anyone truly knows what it IS yet.

I saw an article the other day, I think it was from nymag.com, but they were talking about how they "don't know how to be bored on the internet" anymore. Way back in the early days of the internet, it was the wild west and you didn't need much to impress. There were distractions EVERYWHERE. Newgrounds, Homestarrunner, Maddox, Ebaumsworld, Cracked, SomethingAwful. There were writers just writing whatever the hell they wanted (again, Cracked and Maddox), there were awfully designed websites with terrible layouts and poorly colored text against a poorly colored background. Everyone wanted to use this new thing and see how much fun they could have with it.

And then there was a shift, and suddenly Snapchat and MySpace and Facebook and, really, social media started developing and the internet just became about ourselves. It became about our own ideologies. We didn't care about having fun or being entertained, now we just wanted to find like minds who believed in what we believed, wrong or right (Reddit, 4chan, even Facebook). The internet suddenly became "the cult of me."

It's really sad. It's one of the reasons I'm glad I found my way back here and connected with you guys. Blindsideblitz really is a throwback. It's not about one thing, although the elements certainly all tie in together. Really, though, if BSB had a facebook page and a twitter account and grossly promoted itself, we'd have an influx of characters that would inevitably end up unruly. And, I'm not saying back in the day the internet wasn't without it's assholes (Hey guys, remember Madden Planet and crazed Andy from Madden World, I believe it was? I do), but everyone's so wrapped up in their bubbles these days that any information that threatens to burst it immediately sends them into a frenzy.

To a certain extent, I get it. We live in really, really strange times. Social media became a weapon, evidently, and it's done it's work well. I left Facebook this year after the Cambridge Analytica nonsense and I don't regret it one bit. It became such a hive for negativity and I just don't need that in my life right now (or ever). And yeah, I had my friends list very curated and even some of those friends I had set to not show their posts in my news feed, it was still lurking in the comments of every article. Everyone knows you can't go to the comments on ESPN articles (and, granted, that may have also been a before social media thing, but it's certainly gotten worse). The loudest voices, no matter how large or small, have always been the loudest, and the hatred and vitriol that regularly flows on the internet has certainly grown louder and louder.

We've seen (and confirmed) movements like GamerGate being used and recruited from for various white nationalist movements. Obviously, beyond just the internet, we've seen (and confirmed) electronic interference in our elections, so bad that some states are actively considering going back to paper ballots, which would suck but be worth it as opposed to the alternative, obviously.

We've seen a search engine become part of the global economy and absolutely redefine what can be done with technology. We've seen a glorified shopping website grow into one of the largest, most profitable business today that now includes streaming services, grocery stores and book stores somehow. We've also seen that same website killing off the old guard of the retail industry (not a Toys R Us reference though, they were killed by something else).

I'm 30 (well, 31 in 14 days OH MY GOD IT'S ONLY TWO WEEKS AWAY), but I always tell people I'm a classic and am more like 60. I enjoy 1920s music, scotch, and peace and quiet, haha. While I certainly acknowledge I may be too focused on the negative (Twitter doesn't help), I can't help but wonder, be it out of nostalgia or something else, if maybe, in the long run, we actually were better off without the internet.

Then again, I wouldn't have met all of you guys and had, essentially, a place to go during high school where I knew I could escape for a while with a group of people, whether we were playing Mafia games, TUFF or just shooting the breeze. So, I don't know.

Like I said at the top, in this (hopefully) middle age I now find myself in (GUYS I WAS IN HIGH SCHOOL WHEN I JOINED THIS SITE I WAS A TEENAGER), I've been doing a lot of reckoning with my past and present, as well as considering mine and my son's future. Every parent worries for their child and I'm no different, I know that, but like all parents I worry about the world that's being left to him, but I consider the world that I grew up in that was left to me. I'm trying to reconcile the dark of this world with the light, and I have so many questions about this life that I know will never be answered (sorry guys, not religious). So, I talk. And I think. And I post here, I suppose.



............This one, while there was a theme, was certainly more general. I do intend to do some "where were you when" type things (this was almost about Columbine before I decided to go in a different direction), but again, this is a place just to reflect and consider and record our history. I hope to see you guys in here too, but I'll be a fairly regular presence here too.

[Day 29 - A Game You Intended To Buy, But Didn't]

Day 29 - A Game You Intended To Buy, But Didn't


Fairly straight forward. Sure there can be a whole range of answers for this through the years.

My answer: Donkey Kong 64. After 3 great games on the SNES, DK64 was expected to be the pinnacle of the 64's power. Instead, we basically got a Mario 64 clone that was absolutely bloated with things to do yet it lacked the ease and ingenuity of those SNES DK games. I rented it, hated it, and never did end up buying it.

as for not friends for a game night you guys could start getting a few games and start playing amongst yourselves and as you get friends you can weave them in.

Yeah, we got Kingdomino but it plays so quick it's hard to really get into. We also got Pandemic Cthulhu but after reading the rule book for what felt like 5 hours we...kind of gave up.

And obviously games like Taboo or Cards Against Humanity we can't really play with just the two of us (I debate with myself about having kiddo play that when he's here but even though he's an incredibly smart and mature 12 year old I'm not sure he's ready for some of those cards, even despite seeing movies like Deadpool).

See, I've had this odd fixation on, essentially, the 20s, 40s, 50s and 70s. And not so much the wars and what not, just, the lives of the general public. Watching Twilight Zone and just seeing the set designs and the ways people are portrayed (before weird stuff happens) or the few happy episodes that tend to focus on suburbia, it's just fascinating to me.

Definitely do. You won't regret it.

I actually thought about this earlier and just didn't do it, so I promise I didn't conceive of this just to brag. I just think it'd be cool to have a thread where we can talk about our life, either past, present or future (mainly past because I'm in this phase where I'm fascinated with American history, but more from ordinary people than like, watching documentaries with professional historians).

Anyways.

So, my contribution today is a "present" story than a past (earlier I'd thought about doing a "where were you during 9/11" thing, so that's more where my focus was in starting this).

Today, I got engaged. Um, again. But first time to my current girlfriend! And considering she's the first girl that I've dated and never broke up with, Im pretty confident this will stick. It'll be 2.5 years in June and everything's been great (I've had more than enough bad so I can easily recognise good these days), and that's that. So yeah.

Anyways, I think this will be a cool thread for life events and reflection or future plans. Ive never been to Michigan, I could listen to Norm spin tales about his college days in here. Hearing Crewe's stories from Texas and his many adventures. I enjoy Tider's stories about his family and I enjoy hearing his perspective from his Alabama roots. So hopefully we can all share here and, maybe one day no one will come to this place but all our tales will be here.