In defense of Wal-mart?

Wow... Open mouth, insert foot...
I bet Wal-mart didn't see this coming when they hired Andrew Young.

3D Space Hulk

Here is a guy who casts 3D Space Hulk corridors by himself with resin, using LEGO in the production too. :) That's pretty cool. Looks like you can get quite a bit of detail just from resin. Interesting...

The Glass Bead Game

The book "the Glass Bead Game" sounds really interesting to me now, after I read this review. I've always found Hesse to be unnecessarily mystical, but from this review, I could be wrong. Definitely a good addition to my "to read" list.

ATI's trade up program

Wow, I just recently found out that ATI has a pretty good deal going on. You can trade in your old video card, no matter what kind it is, for $80 Cdn in credit towards buying a small selection of newer ATI cards from their website. The link is here. There are only three cards to choose from, but the most interesting one is the All-In-Wonder X800XT. This card has all the capabilities of a regular X800XT, which is old but still quite good, plus all the All-In-Wonder TV functions. After the $80 credit it's only $120! That's pretty awesome considering I've seen plain X800XTs in Edmonton stores recently for around $300. This is probably a really good deal for people like me who still have an AGP motherboard but want a faster card without upgrading everything.

LCD Monitor

Okay, I finally broke down and bought a ViewSonic VX2025wm LCD monitor. This is a 20" monitor with 1680X1050 resolution that goes fo $370 at Best Buy, and it's supposed to be one of the better cheap 20" monitors. I've only had it for one day, but I'm liking it so far. There appears to be no dead pixels, and at 1680X1050 resolution with a DVI connection, the image is very sharp. I do have to turn on large types though - this monitor is farther away from my eyes than my old one, and I have trouble seeing small type. (this maybe a case of my needing new glasses) I also test-watched Lord of the Rings on the monitor and there seems to be little or no ghosting. The games that I currently play also seem to do okay, although they tend to be slower now because of my old graphics card. (Radeon 9600) "Dawn of War," one of the games that I play most often, doesn't support widescreen play, but it does give you black bars on the sides of the monitor so things don't look stretched. All in all, it's good so far, and I'm glad I don't have to deal with my old heavy CRT monitor anymore...

Advice on LCD Monitors

Okay I need some advice here. I've been thinking of replacing my old CRT monitor with a new LCD one, but I'm kind of torn on what type of monitor to get. Should I just get a regular 19" LCD monitor, (some of these, especially the Acer, BenQ, or LG ones, are very cheap) or should I get one of the cheaper widescreen 20" ones? (again LG and BenQ ones are quite cheap at around $350) I'm not a super connoisseur or anything, so I don't really mind the cheaper models with somewhat worse display quality. In any case, any of the new LCDs will be better quality than my current monitor. What do you (the few people who read this blog) think is a better deal?

Valley of the Wolves

A while ago Majik Sznak posted about the Turkish movie "Valley of the Wolves" on his blog. It looks like someone has reviewed it here. And - I'm pretty sure this is naughty - there are clips from the movie on the website. From the looks of them, it seems the review's quite right: it's really badly acted, especially from Gary Busey and Billy Zane. Busey gives some really badly delivered lines, and Billy Zane, well, you can never tell if he's trying or not.

Warhammer 40k Cityscapes

Wow, I found this German site where someone has gone through a lot of effort to build ruined cityscapes for Warhammer 40k. The game boards are very nice looking, like this one, or this one.

Forgeworld

Forgeworld is an UK company that produces Warhammer 40k "spinoff" miniatures that Games Workshop doesn't make itself. Their miniatures are ludicrously detailed and gorgeous to look at, but are also ludicrously expensive. Check out some of these:

A Tau Orca Dropship: Notice all the troops and battlesuits sitting in the back.

A Tyranid Malanthrope

A Tyranid Trygon

A Tyranid Heirophant

A human super-heavy tank

A human inquisitor and his toilet paper dispenser :)

My WH40k Page

If you look to the right, I've put up a link to my Warhammer 40k website. It's still under construction, but it already has some interesting material on the miniatures I have.

Wizkids' Pirates

Well, this looks like an interesting card/board game. You play it using cardboard pirate ships that can loose masts after they are hit. They even have a "how to play" section in flash animation that's bound to please pirate fans. :)

Looks like it could be an interesting game to play, but too bad I'm spending all my gaming money on WH40k now... :(

Solo: The Movie

This is great. It's a trailer for Star Wars set in modern times.

Mismatched TV Crossovers

On a forum I visit regularly, I saw this interesting fun exercise being done by people. Basically, they come up with a scenario where two totally different TV shows (different in everything - genre, atmosphere, outlook on life, etc.) have a crossover.

One of the examples is the following:

Four Vietnam veterans, framed for a bank robbery and hunted by the military and law enforcement, try to help innocents as a group of good vigilantes-for-hire. Through an old Vietnam buddy of theirs, they hear of a small town where a sheriff keeps a sort of strange, tyrannical control over the citizens. And bad (not to mention strange) things happen to those who get in his way. Our do-gooders decide to go to the town and rid the good people of that sheriff. So "Hannibal" Smith, B.A. Barrachus, Templeton Peck, and "Howling Mad" Murdock pack into their van and drive to Trinity, South Carolina...

(in case you didn't know, this is a crossover between the A-Team and American Gothic.)

So, if anyone still reads this blog, what idea can you come up with? :)

The real Da Vinci Code

Here is a documentary on the current theories about the holy grail hosted by Tony Robinson. (yes Baldrick) It's interesting, although I think it went too deep into the whole "Church suppressing proto-feminist gnostic teachings" bit.

The Gathering

This is a great commercial, (apparently Chilean) with a lot of movie villains doing, uh, holiday things.

Free Novel

Speaking of John Derbyshire, one of his novels is now published on his website for free. I've read through the first dozen chapters, and it looks pretty good. A boy's life growing up in 1960's China, the Red Guard, father becoming a poster, coups, anal rape, decapitation, and that's all just in the first dozen chapters!

Film with Bruce Lee

This is an interesting article by John Derbyshire where he tells the story of how he got an uncredited part in a Bruce Lee movie. With very interesting descriptions of Hong Kong in the early 70's.

History Spork

This is awesome. It's basically a MST3000 type take on historical inaccuracies in movies.

John Kenneth Galbraith

This is a good obituary of John Kenneth Galbraith, with a summary of his life's works. Needless to say, I disagree somewhat with the author's anti-statist economics leanings, but the last line of the obit about Galbraith versus the modern American Left is very well worth pondering.

Forest in Winter

Wow.... wow.... this is great. :) Just click on "Forest In Winter." It's.... well you just have to see for yourself.