Week 3 Recap:
Man did this week suck. I had my first failure on Thursday (week 3 day 2) and again for week 3 day 3 which I did today (Monday). I basically skipped working out Thursday-Sunday mainly due to being sick and having to work. I really shouldn't let excuses get in the way after I made so much progress during those first 2 weeks but my body just gave out on me. Everything hurt and I felt sick to my stomach and even getting out of bed was a challenge. I literally spent anytime I wasn't at work (I don't have sick time at this new job and with money being tight as it is, I had to suck it up) sleeping. I'm making it a point to re-do week 3 during week 4 because honestly I barely made it through this week, if I try to push ahead I'm only screwing myself over more. You can't build a house on a weak foundation and I'm not going to build walls without getting the fundamentals down first.
With that said, my results for this week: *Starting stats in parenthesis
Thoughts on week 4:
Week 4 should be re-named week 3 part 2. I'm not happy about my lack of progress this week but I know that to do this properly I'll have to work extra hard on eating properly, getting over my shin pain and just all around being a total badass like Luigi. ^_^
Week 2 Recap:
So after my little rant on Black Friday, we are back to the MGS challenge! This week was especially challenging not only because of Thanksgiving, working at both jobs for Black Friday, but also the loss of my Uncle Kerry this week. He was a really cool guy and I'll miss him, he's the reason I started watching Red Green and despite all of the crap he gave me I knew deep down he thought I was alright. Overall though, I improved my diet by only going out to eat Friday, otherwise I've been trying to eat healthier meals at home whenever possible and it feels like it's working. Today (Sunday) I took the adult version of the presidential fitness test, I don't feel I did too bad, and by doing it I knocked out my 2 tests for my 100pushups/200 situps plan by doing 1:00 reps as quickly as possible for the test. My results are below:
Congratulations! You scored above
average on 1 of the 4 elements of the adult fitness test. Your score was
average or below average for your age on 3 of the 4 tests. You may wish
to talk with a fitness or exercise professional about activities you can do to
improve your performance on these tests. Keep up the good work! Remember to be
active every day and work to maintain a healthy weight.
Your aerobic fitness is below what
is recommended for good physical health for persons of your age and gender. For
health purposes, it is recommended that you increase your physical activity to
improve your aerobic capacity.
Fitness
Component
Test
Event
Your
Results
Your
Score
Aerobic Fitness*
1.5-Mile Run
17:38
5%ile
Muscular Strength
Half Sit-Ups
35
35%ile
Push-Ups
35
70%ile
Flexibility
Sit-and-Reach
14
40%ile
Overall Score (based on percentile
average)
37%ile
Body Composition
BMI:
25.3
Overweight, Increased Risk of
Disease
Waist Circumference
32
With that said, my results for this week: *Starting stats in parenthesis
Thoughts on week 3:
I realize that I'm writing this on a Sunday night which technically could still be considered part of week 2, but I wanted to log in my results so I don't forget to do it. I only work at one job this week so I should be able to get all my workouts in and maybe do a little bit more dependent on how I'm scheduled the rest of the week. I'm hoping to improve on my running speed, I can run for about 3 minutes at 7mph now, which is a huge improvement from when I started, I've found I'm usually gassed by then though so I've been trying to keep it around 6-6.5 when setting a run speed so I can finish the program without taking shortcuts. Here's to a prosperous week 3!
WARNING: This particular blog is gonna contain some stuff that might offend some of you, if you are easily offended or have a heart condition, come back in a week when I resume my fitness updates or write about something in a non-ranting format.
Not a rant about Rebecca Black's song Friday, but seriously don't get me started on that.
Black Friday, or the day after America's Thanksgiving holiday, not to be confused with the Steely Dan song by the same name is the purest form of evil ever created. Known to retailers as the busiest shopping day of the year, retailers use this day to make up sales for the year by "slashing prices" and offering "doorbuster deals!" Basically, it's a bunch of corporate fatcats saying, you know what would get people into our stores? Let's make our employees work at ungodly hours while the consumers being the bunch of cattle that they are trample each other to save a few bucks on crap they don't fucking need! Target and Wal-Mart are the biggest douchebags in all of this, opening at 8pm on Thanksgiving. Yeah, fuck the people that work there, people can't wait a fucking day to go "save" money on "stocking stuffers", they need to go out on a day you're supposed to be celebrating spending time with your families and giving thanks. The only thanks being given that day are by soccer moms and the elderly so they can ditch the Cowboys game and spend their night being a complete dick to other people and retail employees. I used to work at a toy store during black Friday, let me tell you, it was the saddest thing I've ever seen. The store opened at 5am, meaning employees had to be there by 4:30am. No sooner than 5:00am hit my boss tried, and I do mean tried to open the gate to the store, only to be trampled by fucking nut jobs trying to save 10 dollars on a fucking Razor scooter, do kids even ride those things anymore?! I mean seriously, you're gonna run someone over to save 10 fucking dollars? And this was pre-Bush, before the economy hit an all time low and guys like me had to work 2 jobs to pay their bills. Here's what I think all of these ass hats should go do:
All of these people are jackasses.
Take all the money you "save" and donate to a food shelf, the salvation army, Toys for Tots, something, to make up for the fact you are indeed a worthless piece of crap sucking all the life out of the rest of us and deserve to have those "stocking stuffers" shoved up where the sun don't shine and take your "doorbuster deals" and shine those son of a bitches up real nice, and wait for it...shove them up your ass too! And so help me if you try to wish me a Merry Christmas...
Week 1 Recap:
Today marks the end of my first week of my fitness challenge to pass the FBI physical by February 19th. Honestly the first week wasn't anywhere near as bad as I thought it'd be. I've made a conscience effort to try to eat better, and while life has been kicking me while I'm down I'm trying to persevere. I've switched my workout schedule up a bit from what I originally planned on doing. I'm going to be doing run5k Tues/Thurs/Sat and the 100pushups/200situp programs on Mon/Wed/Fri in place of the rebel fitness guide, mainly because I hate squats and doing max reps gets boring for me, if I have a structured plan I know what I have to do and am more likely to do not sandbag because I don't want to push myself.
Thoughts on week 2:
This next week is gonna be a nightmare to get through, I just found out today that one of my uncles passed away, he was a pretty cool guy and I'm going to miss him. On top of that, I've been having issues between my 2 jobs with scheduling, Thanksgiving being this week and the whole "Black Friday" mess I'm going to have very little time to get things done. Regardless of all the setbacks I'm going to have,whether they be emotional, physical,financial and or just overall time I want this more than anything right now, I need this. Accomplishing this goal is keeping me up at night, I wake up in the morning and all I can think is how I'm going to beat yesterday's mileage ran, or push ups/situps completed.
So while paying bills the other day I realized that I had a gym membership that was sadly going to waste, and by going to waste, I mean I maybe go once every 2 weeks and that's when I'm feeling ambitious. After doing some number crunching and a bit of reading I think I found my solution to my problem. I have tried just about every exercise program you can think of, Stronglifts, P90X, Tae Bo, I even bought the perfect pushup! Honestly, I've spent quite a bit of time and money trying stuff that just didn't work for me. So you're asking yourself, how is this going to be different? What's stopping me from quitting after a week this time? This time, I've set a goal for myself. I'm going to work towards passing the requirements to become a FBI special agent. Will I join after reaching these goals? Most likely no, but it'll be a good feeling knowing that I'm going to be in the best physical shape I've ever been in and that alone is saying something.
I'm shooting for this, you know, sans the blonde hair and British charm
To reach a perfect score (40 points) I need to hit the following benchmarks:
1. Over 58 sit-ups in a 1 minute time span (I can currently do 25) 2. 40.9 seconds or below in a timed 300 meter sprint (no clue yet, I'm sure it's not 40.9 seconds though) 3. Over 71 pushups in a row (I'm currently averaging about 12-15 without stopping) 4. Running 1.5 miles in under 8:59 (I can currently run a mile in roughly 11 minutes, I think my best was around 10:34, tacking on the extra half mile we'll say I'm around 16:30 minutes)
While I realize that this isn't going to be something I can accurately set a time frame to, I'm giving myself until February 19th to score at least a 12 (which is passing.). My prize for reaching this milestone? The new Metal Gear Solid Uprising, oh and being in the best shape I've ever been in...or something.
Taken while visualizing Ivan Drago
I took photos and measurements from my first day which was Monday November 12th,2012
Current Weight: 151.2 lbs
Waist 34 inches
Hips 37 inches
Biceps 11 inches
Legs 18 inches
Neck 14 inches
Body Fat % 21.68
I'll post updates either weekly or bi-weekly depending on how much actual time I have. I'm currently keeping an excel spreadsheet with notes regarding my workouts and how I feel overall. Wish me luck guys, because hopefully, we'll be looking at a much better me.
(This was a post I was originally going to throw up over at Destructoid but due to the short length I am posting it here...)
Infamous: Festival of Blood
With Halloween nearly here the Playstation Store has decided to put a
number of their horror themed genre games on sale this month, one of which was
Infamous: Festival of Blood. For those who aren’t familiar with the franchise,the main character Cole McGrath, is given
super human powers that allow him to harness the power of electricity after an
earthquake hits his town. Festival of
Blood stars the hero Cole, getting bit by a vampire named Bloody Mary, yes, the
same Bloody Mary the drink is named after.
Rather than give away the whole
story I’ll dive right into the gameplay. Overall, the game controls quite
nicely just like the other Infamous titles did, this one doesn’t use the karma
system which was a main factor in the other titles, which I guess is alright
since your goal is to find Mary. My one main complaint about this game is that
is very short. I finished the main story in just under 4 hours, getting all the
trophies unlocked took maybe another hour to an hour and a half tops. If you are still craving more content from
this game, the developers did put in a level editor and the ability to play user
created levels to add some much needed replay ability to an otherwise short
title. As mentioned earlier in my review the game is
currently on sale for $5.00 when it is normally $15.00. I suggest you pick it
up if you have a free night or want an easy 100% completion to fill out your
trophy collection.
A few weeks ago I was sitting at home and while browsing through the selection of movies on netflix, I noticed they had "Monster A- Go-Go" as a film, little did I know, watching that would bring me back to a place I hadn't been since I was around 10 years old. It brought me back to the world of MST3k...
For those of you not familiar with MST3k, or Mystery Science Theatre 3000,
The greatest group of robots ever assembled, you know, besides Johnny 5 and Robocop
it's a show about a guy named Joel (later replaced in the series by Mike) who is trapped in space on the Satellite of Love with his robot friends Cambot, Gypsy, Crow, and my personal favorite Tom Servo. The cast is forced to watch terrible movies as part of a science experiment and have no control over when the movies begin nor end. While I have by no means seen all of the episodes I do have a few favorites that I will discuss in briefly below. ( Should also note, that while Gamera had one of my favorite songs of all time, it didn't make my list because I honestly just don't remember anything else besides the song)
Warrior of the Lost World: More like, Warrior of the Lost Plot
Number 5. "Warrior of the Lost World"
This movie was pretty difficult to sit through, it ranked in my top 5 though due to the amount of funny jokes that were laced throughout the episode, mainly them cheering on Megaweapon and celebrating the annoying bike in the movie being destroyed. The plot of the movie involves a biker in the time after the apocalypse and his really cheesy motorcycle trying to save this woman's father, I missed half the plot because the wife got home during that part and talked through a lot of it. ^_^
My favorite quote(s): "This isn't Mad Max it's Sad Max." "The only thing keeping this from being Cannonball Run is Dom Deluise."
Soultaker: Pretty decent name for a movie that took about an hour and a half of my life.
Number 4. "Soultaker"
This movie wasn't half bad for what it was, it reeked of cheesy 80's cliches, and had one of my favorite lines ever at the beginning of the movie. Basically these whacky teenagers get into a car accident are tracked down by the "Soultaker" played by Joe Estevez. Yes, the younger brother of Martin Sheen and uncle to Emilio Estevez and Charlie Sheen. I really don't want to go too much more into the plot details because frankly you'd just have to watch it to really get any enjoyment out of it.
My favorite quote(s): " Bet you can never get the smell of Hardee's outta that car." "The Soooooullll-taker!"
"Don't tounge the reaper!"
Mitchell: The movie that probably ruined or made Joe Don Baker's career
Number 3. "Mitchell"
A lot of people rank this as their favorite episode ever, it is definitely an important one in the MST3K series as it sees Joel leaving the show and Mike being brought in as the new host. I really can't say which host I like better as I think they both were okay, my favorite character on the show will always be Tom Servo followed very closely by Crow. I honestly don't even remember the plot of the movie, I think it's a renegade cop flick that was the style for the timeframe that this came out in, I was too busy laughing my ass off about the film ranked #1.
Favorite Quote(s): "I've seen faster chases in funeral processions." "This makes Driving Miss Daisy look like Bullit!" "Baby oil?! NOOOOOOO!"
2."The Puma Man"
The Puma Man: AKA Greatest American Hero starring a giant aztec guy!
The most blatant rip off of "The Greatest American Hero" ever, this one almost took number 1 for me, mainly because "Puma, Man, he flies like a moron!" "Soundtrack by my little brother's Casio." The film is about a guy who comes from a long line of "Puma Men" from space that can fly and are apparently terrible at fighting. I never knew Pumas could fly before watching this movie, but hey, you learn something new everyday right?
Favorite quote(s): "Believe it or not, this movie's still on, it should've ended 2 hours ago." "When, you want, the flavor of bacon in a dip!" "Take that members of Boston!"
Final Justice: Most confusing ending to a movie ever, but man gotta love that theme song.
1."Final Justice"
Rather than go even bothering to tell you about this film, or picking out my favorite lines (which I definitely had a few) just watch the end credits which I've linked here. (song starts about :22 seconds in)
So I recently left a job I hated, no, more like loathed, (I had a stomach ulcer and rather than getting to go to the hospital, was told to "tough it out." it took a call to my then district manager before I was allowed to go to the hospital, which was a good thing because I could've died!) to try something in a different field. Well, 2 weeks later and I got let go from said job (F.G. was a crappy company to work for anyhow...) and am currently working at a retail location which shall remain nameless, but due to things outside of the companies control I'm only scheduled 1 day a week at this new job. So I did what any other person in my predicament would do. I've been applying to every company within a 20 mile radius of my house. Not sure if any of my readers have tried looking for work lately, but seriously WTF is with the assessment questions nowadays? I tried applying at a local restaurant, I guarentee you this place doesn't pay more than minimum wage, and they want me to write an essay as to why I want to work there. Really? You want to know why I want to work here, well, I need money so I don't lose my house, can buy food so I can eat, and not have to go on welfare? Is that a good enough reason? It gets better though, they want to know what I loved and hated about my previous jobs. I loved the fact they gave me money, I hated the fact they gave me little amounts of money for the amount of time I've spent at said jobs, or you know, the whole working for a place for almost 10 years and making less than a new hire. (Again, F you F***x!)
The part of this I find the most frustrating is that the U.S. is in this recession, people can't find work, people are filing for unemployment, my guess for the high rates of unemployment is due to the fact applying for a job takes 3 hours to do, if you can't use a computer or have internet access you don't get to work, no more filling out a 2 page application with black pen, no, you apply online, you write an essay on why you think that this company is the greatest thing since sliced bread and that you'd give up both of your testicles just to be a fucking cashier here, only to get a form letter. "Sorry you did not meet our requirements to work here, you obviously are way too intelligent and have a soul, we only hire mindless robots who don't question authority."
I guess I'll go back to being the tour guide on the jungle cruise ride...
This ends my rant, feel free to leave me comments below, it'll break up the repetitiveness of filling out my contact information and job history that they just had me upload in my resume...
The link you see here will take you to my Destructoid.com community blog, I'll still be posting some stuff here, but if you are into video games, this would be where to go.
Every video game fanatic knows about "The Run." It's that time when you are just plain dominating in whatever video game you are playing, and then the unthinkable happens. In my case, this occurred during "The Binding Of Isaac." I somehow managed to get all the way to the Depths 2 with a full rack of hearts and a bottom row of soul hearts, not to mention, sister Magdaline, the deck of tarot cards, a 1up and a few stat upgrades as well, then Monstro 2 happened. For those of you not familiar with this game, I'll try my best to fill you in.
This was the thing that killed me...I HATE YOU MONSTRO II!!!!!!!
You are Issac, a young boy who escapes to his Mother's basement after his Mom begins to hear the voice of "God" and wants to kill you. The best way of describing this game is a Legend Of Zelda clone while instead of using a sword to attack, you fend monsters off with Issac's tears. The dungeons are random and power ups can be a toss up sometimes being either a lifesaver or in some cases, a royal pain in the butt. (More specifically the pills, it's always a 50/50 chance of either getting something awesome like full HP, or getting the bone with something called "Bad Trip". Now that I've filled you in with the concept of said game, we've gotta discuss this run, the whole point of this particular entry.
This particular playthrough followed up an almost equally awesome run in which that I got killed by a random fly...yes, flies are the bane of your existence in this game. Imagine having x-ray vision, 99 coins, (found the dollar from a slot machine) 15 bombs and 5 keys, oh and a full rack of hearts, to get one room away from the boss room only to find a room with projectiles spewing in every direction, and death following shortly after.
Screen shot of the game, nowhere near illustrates my awesomeness I had going.
I had decided that I had one more playthrough in me, after which it was bedtime. Well, 4 playthroughs later, and "The Run" happened. I whipped through the first 2 bosses (this playthrough Duke of Flies and Fistula) not to mention Gluttony and Envy, with no issues. I was getting awesome power ups one after the next, maxing out bombs, hearts and keys. I found Sister Magdaline who is basically a bloody fetus who shoots, well, blood at your enemies, then I found the 1up mushroom. This was amazing, maxed out regular hearts, maxed out soul hearts, I was ready to take on the world, then similar to my previous game, I got trolled by a room of re-spawning zombies with flies mixed in, I lost all my soul hearts but got to Monstro 2. Monstro's attack usually consists of spraying blood at you, jumping down and crushing you, and occasionally leaking out flies. Monstro 2, has an added bonus of shooting a f'n laser at you...so not only am I getting owned by random splatters of blood, I'm getting nailed by this laser beam, this guy is seriously like the New Orleans Saints of this video game, total cheap shot artist. I get him down to nearly no health left, maybe 3 shots, I say maybe because I get killed. I respawn thanks to my 1up. I go back in the boss room, we are both at full health, it's on like Donkey Kong, he's going down. I ignore the cat sitting in meowing next to me and the fact it's almost 4 in the morning, this guy's done for, I'm getting to Mom and finishing this tonight. Monstro 2 basically mops the floor with me.
This was me after I died.
I get the famous kill screen, I was killed by a giant turd with a laser beam, I'm leaving all my awesome power ups to my cats Newton,Figaro,and Gizmo. I think it's time for bed.
So my good pal Travis over at "Dragons Are Delicious" wrote an article about his video game secrets, I figured since I haven't written anything in a while, I'd do mine as well. So here we go, some things you didn't know about me, in regards to video games...
-I never finished Super Mario Bros 2, Keith Courage in Alpha Zone, or about 85% of the other "retro" titles we owned as kids, I did however beat Kung-Fu on the NES, multiple times.
- I once stayed up 24 hours playing Daytona USA, I did over 300 laps, as the horse. (it was a cheat code on the Saturn)
-The only sega consoles I didn't own as a child were the 32X and the Game Gear, and to this day I still don't.
-I've never fully played through FF7, I got bored 10 minutes into it.
- I didn't beat Secret of Mana until I was in my 20s, and had to do it on an emulator at that ( the cart was valued over 80 bucks by the time I got a SNES)
-I've never played the Silent Hill series, I'm planning on rectifying this now that the HD collection is out, and finishing the Jak and Daxter games ( I did beat 1).
That's about all I've got, until I think of something else to write about...
The title says it all, I've finally reached that point in my life that it's time to put away childish things, and start focusing on being an adult. I'm in the process of selling off video games, not because I need the money, but because I realize that I'm getting older, I don't play them and someone else could be enjoying them instead of having them just sitting in a box buried in my basement. I dug out a box filled with old Ps2, N64 and Dreamcast games, all of them at one point in time were fun to me, now I look at them and all I can think of how much space they are taking up. To say a part of me died would be an understatement, a large chunk of me is gone, I no longer enjoy pro wrestling, video games just aren't that fun anymore, and I'm beginning to think that everything I've done up to this point in my life was a complete waste of time. I used to love computers, web design and drawing in general, hell, I've got a degree in multimedia and graphic design because of it. I'm starting to think that was a waste of time. All it got me is a job I'm unhappy at, but one that I'm too afraid to leave because of the economy. I'm hoping that slowly getting rid of stuff will help me find what is really important in life and maybe I can use the money I'm getting from this stuff to take a vacation and form new memories...
Note: I basically copied my review from the Kingdom of Foom forum so if you've already read it there, it's the same thing.
Hey guys, I've decided to take some time out of my semi-busy life to actually contribute back to the community that has given me so much entertainment, or something. Today I picked up WWE Wrestlefest for the iPhone for $2.99. (Just a heads up, if you own an iPad and an iPhone, the game isn't cross transferable, they are 2 separate apps!)
Graphics: The graphics in this game are pretty amazing for an iOS game, it really has an arcade feel to it, the characters look like their real life counterparts, done in a comic book style. The crowd even looks pretty cool which was a nice touch.
Sound: Although every person comes out to the exact same song, they did a nice job with the sound effects.Justin Roberts announces each character before the match begins and the kicks and punches sound pretty good for something I'm playing on my phone, music doesn't even sound this good on it. So that's saying something.
Gameplay: Granted I've only gotten to play this for a short period of time (About 2 hours) the controls are decent for what it is, if you've played Street Fighter 4 on the iPhone, controls are very similar, you have a joystick on the left side of the screen, and 2 buttons (one for punch, one for kick) on the right.) It took me a little bit to get used to the controls, my first match Undertaker whooped me like a government mule, poor Macho Man will never be the same. After I took time and looked at the in game manual, I had a better idea of what was going on and actually won a match. From what I can tell, special moves just kind of happen at random, I managed to hit an RKO with Randy Orton as well as his swinging backbreaker. I've seen Undertaker use the tombstone piledriver and the Last Ride as well. As far as gameplay modes are concerned: Exhibition, Road to Wrestlemania, Royal Rumble, Saturday Night's Main Event Tournament, Tag Team and Gauntlet Match fill out the options, meaning that there is a lot to choose from, which isn't a bad deal even though all of them play pretty much the same, throw in multiplayer (which sadly I can't seem to get to work, nobody in my vicinity has this game) and the $2.99 price tag isn't so bad.
Playable Characters: Jake "The Snake" Roberts, John Cena, Rey Mysterio, The Rock, Randy Orton, "Macho Man" Randy Savage, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, and the Undertaker fill in the main roster. I would've liked to have had LOD or at least Demolition make it in, I suppose though this is WWE Wrestlefest, not the WWF I remember as a kid, and besides, does WWE even have a legit tag team anymore? Air Boom? Epico and Primo? Anyone?
Arenas: Your choices consist of Smackdown, Raw, Wrestlemania, Royal Rumble, Saturday Night's Main Event, and if you want to pay extra money, the "Old" Survivor Series arena. Honestly they all look exactly alike, just the ring aprons are different.
Complaints: My only real gripe with this game is that I have to pay extra money to unlock the following people: Big Boss Man, CM Punk, Shawn Michaels, Sheamus, Triple H, and the Survivor Series ring. Now granted, it's 99 cents, but why not make it an unlockable you can earn by completing the different modes? I know that DLC has become a common place but it seems like every game is doing this now. I suppose it worked in the 80's, it might as well work now.
Overall thoughts: For 4 dollars (I caved in and bought the DLC) I'm not too upset with this game, I've definitely spent money on a lot worse (DLC for Heavy Rain comes to mind...) and for an iOS game as I mentioned before, it's pretty well done. So if you enjoy arcade style wrestling, I'd recommend picking this one up.
