Personal Hiatus
Hey everybody. I’m going to be taking the week off from writing, due to the passing of my grandmother. I’ve always used writing as a coping mechanism, but I’m frankly not feeling up to writing comedy right now. Hope to be back monday after next with a Guided, Illustrated, Mildly Stupid Tour of UFC 3.
No Alliteration Thursday: Ingram’s Odyssey
It was 8:30 on the date of June 26th, and a wiser man would have seen this day for what it was. A great day. The kind of day God does not like to bestow upon humble Bobby Ingram. A wiser man would have known that something of catastrophic proportions was about to, as they say in da Hood, go down. I am not a wiser man.
Following a fantastic day spent with a few of my TCNJ friends, it was decided that my Sasha was to meet Stacie’s Sasha, and it was to happen immediately. Now being the courteous guy that I am, I allow my baby out into the backyard to go to the bathroom before bringing her to someone else’s house. Sasha didn’t get the memo. Upon being allowed into Stacie’s backyard, Sasha decided to take approximately 83 craps in the course of 15 minutes, while Stacie and Jaclyn laughed at me.
Sasha, shown after having crapped one of her paws off
Now the Sasha incident doesn’t actually relate to the real fun of the night, rather acted as a harbinger of things to come, for that day was no ordinary Sunday, it was also the day before I had orientation for my new job as a camp counselor. Now, for a normal person this is a simple situation, go to sleep early, wake up and roll out for fun times at the new job. I am no normal person. For me this involves first finding out what time I have to be at work, which I obviously wait until the day before to discover.
Fortunately I had the foolproof plan. I would simply call Corey, and he would fill me in on the required information. Small snag, Corey wasn’t home, he was in the city at the Mets vs. Yankees game. No problem I’ll just give his cell phone a ring. No answer.
*NOTE*It should be noted that Corey’s cellphone display doesn’t really work any longer. It may have to do with having been run over, which may have been my fault. That’s beside the point though.*NOTE*
Now when I say I called Corey, I don’t mean once or twice. As a matter of fact, he would later inform me that one of the few functions his phone could still perform was to tell him how many calls he had missed. Apparently eleven.
As anyone who knows me will tell you, I’m not exactly a morning person. There’s a distinct reason all my classes next semester come no earlier than 2 p.m. So it was urgent that I get the necessary information by some reasonable hour, or I would not be waking up for work.
So midnight rolls around and I have no response. Obviously his phone is either not with him, or he cannot hear it at the game. Plan B. AIM. A simple concise message would inform Corey to kindly tell me when work was to begin.
It was at this point I checked to see how long it had been since the game ended, in an attempt to figure out when Corey would get my messages. Oh great, just after midnight. Good thing traffic in the city isn’t bad, they should be home in a giffy. Just great. 1 a.m. I would give Corey to 1 a.m. Until then I would just have to play a little Final Fantasy X.
So its 2 a.m. and still no word from Corey. As a minor plus, my FFX characters can now kill with mind bullets, that’s telekenisis. Unfortunately, a big minus must be pointed out, that being that mind bullets would not allow me to know what time work was.
HALLELUJAH!!! One of my friends came online. Surely he was at the game, and thus Corey will be home soon. He wasn’t at the game, nor did he know what time work was. Damn you Taco.
2:30. That’s when I said fuck it. Left a note to be woken up at 7:30 and went upstairs to sleep, intent on waking up and viewing Corey’s response, and possibly speeding to work.
2:45. That’s when Sasha started freaking out. Taco it seems, had gone out, and decided to drop in on Bobby. Well, after cleaning up Sasha pee (cleaning up after the mutt becoming a sort of second-rate theme of the night) I talked to Dan, who informed me he thought Corey mentioned work was at 7.
Fuck that. I don’t get up by 7, let alone up and out in time to be somewhere at 7. Like any logical person would do, this causes me to amend my note to be woken at 7:00 on the dot. Compromise.
It is now closing in on 3. All attempts at finding the letter which should hold the desired information have failed, due mainly to my brother taking over the livingroom, and doing whatever the hell he wanted with anything of mine in there. It’s panic time. This I believe is when call number eleven was made, and then genius struck. Farruggio was at the game too. I’ll call him!
Yeah, so they’d been home for over an hour. Asshole went to sleep without checking his instant messages. I’d have to kill him for that. Fortunately Dan thought he had heard him mention being at work by 8. This was after 7, so I went with that, finally getting to sleep around 4 a.m.
Apparently, in the Ingram household, “Please wake me at 7 a.m. ❤ Bobby” means “Allow Bobby to sleep until he wakes on his own accord at 7:32 a.m.” I didn’t know that. No time to shower, I roll out. Technically going nearly double all speed limits is not legal, but damnit it gets you somewhere fast.
Well, being who I am, I drove past the parking lot, so I turned around at the next lot, a big house with a gravel parking lot. I park the car, and follow the provided signs through the woods. After a few minutes, they led me to a big house. With a gravel parking lot.
So I’m finally at work, albeit a minute or two late. ‘Why are there so few cars?’ I ponder. I go inside, and am promptly informed the orientation would begin around 8:30 a.m. God hates me.
Corey rolled in some time around 8:45. He had still yet to check his messages. I hate him.
Wordy Wednesday: Gabey Kotter and the Sorcerer’s Throne – Chapter 1
Chapter One – Giants, Squirrels and Love in a Bathroom
Saturday came faster than Gabey ever could have imagined, and before he knew it he found himself walking through JFK, a colander full of knives in one hand, and a Captain Smilies Little Tykes Magic Kit (Ages 4 and up, not available in Canada) in the other. He felt like a bit of an ass with the crummy plastic rod that was inside, but frankly where the fuck was he supposed to get a real wand on that short of notice.
As he scanned the flight display in hopes of locating his terminal, Gabey simply could not see Flight 93/4 anywhere. Thinking quickly he flagged down a passing security guard. “Excuse me sir,” he offered politely. “Might you be able to tell me where I can find Flight 93/4?”
Looking thoroughly put off at being forced to stop and interact with someone, the guard glared at Gabey. “You think you’re funny kid?”
“Kid? I’m 47 years old. And I just want to know where my flight is.”
“Listen sport, there ain’t no Flight 93/4. Wait a minute, what do you have in that colander?”
“Umm… they’re for my asthma.”
“Oh, makes sense.” With that, the surly guard continued on his way. Continue reading
MMA Monday: Miller Brothers Highlight
Normally, Monday’s are I day I at least endeavor to be funny. Today seems a good time as any to do some of the requisite getting old content onto the new blog posts though, so here’s a Miller Brothers highlight I made before Jim’s fight with Steve Lopez at UFC 103. If you look closely to the left of Jim’s sponsor banner for the Wiman fight, you can totally see my hand on the top of the cage, making me famous.
Future Friday: UFC 110 Quick Picks
Big Nog def. Cain Velasquez TKO, Round 2
Wanderlei Silva def. Michael Bisping by KO, Round 1
Joe Stevenson def. George Sotiropolis by Decision, Unanimous
Ryan Bader def. Keith Jardine by TKO, Round 3
Cro Cop def. Anthony Perosh by TKO, Round 2
Brian Foster def. Chris Lytle by Decision, Unanimous
Stephan Bonnar def. Krzysztof Soszynski by Submission, Round 2
Goran Reljic def. C.B. Dollaway by Submission, Round 1
James Te Huna def. Igor Pokrajac by Decision, Unanimous
Elvis Sinosic def. Chris Haseman by Submission, Round 2.
No-Alliteration Thursday: I Should Not Be Allowed to Fend For Myself in the Real World
Time for another Bobby Classic, as I discuss the many ways I managed to hurt myself in a just a few days of working my job at a summer camp.
Seriously, I mean that. If you don’t believe me, just have a quick perusal of the self-inflicted woes I’ve been stuck with in the mere week-and-a-half since camp started, solely as a result of my own stupidity. Oh, and it bears noting that this list is simply the self-harm I can currently remember from the last few days. You can rest assured that there is plenty more that I am forgetting.
The Pole
Resulting Injuries: Badly scraped/gashed hand, minor scrapes on legs
Also to Blame: Bees
Why I Suck: So, all of 15 minutes into the first day of camp I managed my first moment of brilliance at the basketball courts. With a counselor-to-camper ratio in the cage of a ludicrous number somewhere in the 4:7 neighborhood, it should have been a pretty easy, relaxing morning. A roughly 1-to-2 ration means you have more or less no responsibility, plus the majority of the kids were youngins, so none of the annoying mouthing off you get when mixing sports with eighth-grade boys who are at that age where they are old enough to think they’re tough, but small enough to blow away in a stiff wind. And for awhile, it was pretty calm. Then the bee showed up, and I began flailing and backpedaling with all the grace and control of a raver having a seizure. For those of you who have never been to Camp Sac, the cage can also be used for tennis, so there’s a center pole for the nets, which I completely forgot about in my insect-related panic, leading to one painful introduction of ass-to-asphalt.
Bobby Ball
Resulting Injuries: Emotional trauma, bruising
Also to Blame: Ally, Cooney, Rev. Ed, Kira
Why I Suck: Apparently tired with the cage’s vast game assortment of Knockout and more Knockout, the children were looking for something new to play. Ally suggested “hit Bobby with the basketballs.” My loving fellow-counselors obliged. I spent the next 5 minutes curled in a ball with the campers circled around me, throwing basketballs at my face. I’m not kidding.
Left Field
Resulting Injuries: Loss of a fair portion of the flesh which used to comprise my leg, other painful cuts
Also to Blame: Nick
Why I Suck: With the excellent day one, and its fantastic games time, behind me, day two games found us at the kickball field. As is to be expected, my team was getting trounced, as I without fail manage to wind up as the counselor on the team full of kids that can barely walk, let alone partake in athletic endeavors. And Dan, who, despite his closeness in nomenclature to athletic achievement, is even worse than the kids. So, my team is getting trounced when Nick comes up to bat (foot?), and blasts one deep. Thinking that it will be my hustle that will save the day for Team SpEd, I backpedal (you may be noticing a theme here) while intently following the ball. I kept my eye on the ball all the way to within two feet of my hands (thank you Tee-Ball coaches) at which point my priorities changed, as I suddenly realized I had hit the treeline and fallen into a bush. Now, I can only assume the ball hit a branch and bounced back onto the field as I soon saw Dan fielding it. I’m not sure though, as all my mind was focusing on at the time was the fact that said bush seemed to be of the pricker variety, and that one of the branches was somehow wrapped around my ankle a good four times.
The Greg Louganis
Resulting Injuries: Ouchie wrists, foggy brains
Also to Blame: Ed, Tim, Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson
Why I Suck: Games day four, and fresh off an injury-free day three, I’m feeling pretty good. The group before us had played ultimate Frisbee, but our group thought that was totally gay (which it isn’t, but again, eigth grade guys) and decided to instead play soccer. Being that we’re lazy fucks, the counselors sat around and watched. Then Ed decided he could hurdle the Frisbee goals which, as anyone who knows Ed and has some reasonable estimation of Frisbee goal heights (ie: over 2 feet tall) can tell you, he could not. Being that we’re retarded though, Tim and I joined him in attempting to hurdle them, despite the fact that they are somewhere between four and five feet tall. Eventually, I had the brilliant idea to dive face first to clear the hurdle. Stupid. But, as it turns out, I did it successfully and injury free. Twice. Then I joined the soccer game, and decided to celebrate a goal with a third dive. Not a great decision. I landed wrong on my wrists, then had my head slam into the ground, leading to much wooziness.
Fuck You, Tyler
Resulting Injuries: More cuts on my legs, friction burned shin
Also to Blame: Tyler
Why I Suck: Week two has actually been a banner week for me, since as of right now this is the only injury that I can think of. Tim had us at the maze for capture-the-flag, and since the kids are all a bunch of little cheaters, Tyler and I hid out teams’ respective flags, theoretically somewhere not surrounded by Ow. Tyler put his team’s in the middle of a patch of what I can only reason was razorblades and rebar (is that even how it’s spelled? I don’t know, the metal pole-ish things you find in concrete) which led to my attempted capture, and his attempted tagging of me, being decisions we would both come to regret. As an added bonus, an homage to my last pricker-related injury if you would, while playing kickball today with no sandals (Faith had stolen mine, naturally) I decided to give my throbbing right foot a break by going lefty. The ball took a bounce and I kicked the ball as hard as I could directly off of the big friction burn on my shin that one of the sticks in the maze had given me in my mad-dash to freedom. That fucking hurt.
Witty Title
Resulting Injuries: Broken (possibly) computer monitor… fuck you, that counts
Also to Blame: God
Why I Suck: If you’ve never seen my room, it’s small. Literally, I have a bed, a built in shelf thing, and this weird little bathroom with only half a wall, a broken toilet and a sink with water I would put somewhere below “syringe full of AIDs” on the list of things I’d like to drink from. Because of the putridness of the sink’s pipes, I bring cups of water up to brush with. One of these cups, inexplicably, I left on my monitor last night. Today, and in looking at it now I don’t know what exactly I was trying to do that caused this, I punched said cup, spilling water all over said monitor. Sure enough it fizzled and went all faded on me. I went to the attic to get another old one, which also decided it hated me, before settling on stealing the one hooked up to my brother’s computer. My actual, not-a-piece-of-shit monitor is now sitting upside down on my eight square-feet of floor space in the hopes that will somehow make it not broked anymore. I don’t know, it worked for my phone.
Like I said before, this is simply the stupidness coming to mind right now, and I’m sure there is plenty I missed, but I’ve been writing for awhile now and I still have to do a fake bio for Jim’s birthday present, since he asked me a week ago, and his birthday is now in the multiple-days stage of passed. In my defense, I’ve been diligently working to create a new MillerBrothersMMA.com (which now looks much slicker and more professional if I do say so myself) because it needed to look better to match the big news regarding them that will be going up in the coming days/weeks.
Wordy Wednesday: Gabey Kotter and the Sorcerer’s Throne – Prologue
Gabey Kotter’s eyes fluttered open slowly, as he grunted the grunt of a newly awoken man. The taste of stripper and cheap tequila still hung heavily in his mouth as he sat up, ready for another day eating Hot Pockets and surfing the web for pornography.
“Holy Mother of Cock,” he shouted, as his head’s upward progress was unexpectedly stopped by a protrusion out of the wall. ‘Who put a goddamn shelf above my bed?’ he thought, as his hand felt the bloody gash on his forehead. ‘Unless,’ as his eyes came into focus Gabey realized he was not in his bed, ‘I got drunk and passed out in the pantry under the stairs again.’
Gabey groped blindly in the dark until his hand found the door handle, and he tumbled haphazardly out into the hall. Picking himself up, Gabey stumbled down the hall to the bathroom where he examined his battle wound. The shelf had left a nice cut in the shape of an ‘L’ in the middle of his forehead. “Fuck, that’s gonna leave a scar.” Continue reading
Technology Tuesday: A Terribly Late Review of Dead Rising
This is a repost of a previously-published review on a now-defunct site.
*****
Tossing an apple and some cabbage in the blender, you mix yourself up a green energizer shake before slamming it in one long pull. Feeling untouchable, you adjust your Mega Man helmet and tee up a golf ball, smashing it off the face of a nearby undead who had been shambling toward you unsteadily before being introduced to Mr. Titleist. Taking no time to admire your shot, you grab a nearby frying pan off the grill and quickly apply it to another zombie’s face. Welcome to Dead Rising. This is not your father’s zombie game, or even your older brother’s.
While Capcom has found plenty of zombified success with its Resident Evil series, Dead Rising takes a strong departure from the established norms in undead destruction. No longer are you placed in the shoes of somebody who knows their way around a little killing. That would be too easy. No, this time you’re Frank West, a freelance photojournalist who, upon hearing about some wild happenings going down in a small town in Colorado, decides to charter himself a helicopter into the center of the fracas. After watching a series of increasingly zombie-like occurrences en-route, Frank still seems to think it’s a good call to pop in for a visit and soon finds himself swimming in a sea of the undead, all looking to bite him in and around his face.
As Frank delves deeper into the mysterious truth behind the zombie outbreak he begins to realize all is not as it seems and that this is no ordinary ho-hum zombie outbreak. Frank also proves, unsurprisingly, to be the only mall survivor competent enough to save pretty much every other mall survivor. Through time you can guide the plucky camera-jockey along his evolution from an awkward man who can barely throw a punch into a zombie-killing machine, wielding a chainsaw expertly while possibly wearing a dress.
The Good: To say that Dead Rising has replay value is somewhat akin to saying Halo was a popular title. Technically you’re right, but it’s a bit of an understatement. The game provides you with a wide array of hand-to-hand finishing moves to but zombies down for the count in style, but where it truly shines is when it comes to what items Frank encounters in the mall that he can then turn into a weapon. In short, pretty-much all of them. While there’s of course the standard fare you’d expect in a game which promises an endless supply of guilt-free (hey, they’re already dead, and they’re monsters) slaughter, namely guns, swords and, most entertainingly, a battle axe to swing in wide deadly circles, the game also features more inventive weapons for Frank to employ. Want to see a zombie stumble around aimlessly — well, more aimlessly than usual? Slap a plastic helmet on one, blinding it. If you want to see how they handle a slick floor (hint: poorly) you need only spread a little cooking oil around and enjoy watching Zombies on Ice. In fact, with many weapons containing multiple methods of attack, you can spend an entire day playing around in the mall without encountering all the many ways to dispose of the formerly-living.
The Bad: Don’t count on having a day’s game play to devote to playing around, at least not if you want to get your story. It’s like Capcom spent all this money designing the world’s most-fun playground, then installed it at a high school where the students schedules don’t account for recess. Seldom over the course of Frank’s three days in mall do you get time to just go wild on the undead population, leaving players with the choice of being a good-little hero and getting the earth-shattering story or running around with a sledgehammer to pop heads. Suffice it to say it makes advancing the plot, despite knowing you’re progressing towards a final goal, still feel a bit like you’re not playing it right. Another problem the strict schedule creates comes with the game’s “unique” save system, which some might describe as mind-blowingly stupid. Dead Rising allots you a grand total of one save space per profile which is automatically overwritten when you save your game. While this is frustrating enough on its own, it reaches a new level when you get to day three and hurry off to a mall bathroom to save your game only to discover, upon picking the controller back up later, that from your lone save point you don’t have time to get where you need to go to continue getting the story, and you’ll have to restart the whole thing if you hope to beat the game. Tough luck, kiddo.
The Ugly: Capcom’s already successful Resident Evil series reached new levels of popularity with Resident Evil 4. After months of careful study, the designers must have come to the conclusion that what everybody loved about the game wasn’t all the zombie killing, it was those exhilarating times you got to escort the inept Ashley, because nearly all side-quests in Dead Rising, as well as several plot-mandatory quests, entail leading one or more survivors through the mall. Repetitive missions are bad enough by themselves, but constantly forcing gamers to put up with escort missions, long established as one of the most frustrating challenges in gaming, is just plain mean.
The Verdict: At the end of the day, the pure fun of Dead Rising’s gameplay is enough to overcome some of its less-desirable quirks. Sure the single save file can grate on your nerves at times, but there’s nothing that says you can’t simply go to town with the mall’s arsenal without saving afterward, and destroying your progress when you feel like a little GTA-caliber mayhem. The game does also attempt to add a little variety into the copious escort missions, changing the number and abilities of the escorted, who will range from able to fend for themselves with weapons to needing to be carried. While Dead Rising may not be a flawless effort, it’s still a unique title that packs plenty of bang for your buck.
MMA Monday: A Guided, Illustrated, Mildly Stupid Tour of UFC 2
Welcome back to tournament number two of the Ultimate Fighting Championships. If you’re just joining us for the first time, you missed out on a tall Dutchman abusing fat men, and a little Brazilian fellow choking the life out of a one-gloved boxer, a dude in a mankini and a fat-kicking Dutchman. For today’s tournament, things have been ramped right the hell up, with 16 men instead of 8, though you only get to watch 8 of the 15 fights anyways. Honestly, the early fights seem like they kind of sucked, and you can rest assured we’re in for clips of all the best preliminary assaults, so it’s kind of alright we’re jumping right to the final prelim. As always, to avoid any potential litigation, all pictures depicting fights on the card are care of my 6-year-old neighbor Timmy.
Leading the broadcast for UFC 2 is Brian Kilmeade, promoted from his position as post-fight interviewer, presumably because producers felt his performance really stuck out as the most superb at UFC 1, which is akin to being the member of a surgical team that was least drunk. Joining him is the somewhat-crazy Jim Brown, and the new grappling expert for the broadcast, Ben Perry. Gone from the booth are Bill Wallace, deemed too terrible at broadcasting, and Kathy Long, deemed too having a vagina for the cultured audience of 90’s cage fighting to endure.
The crew does a great job of continuing the sport’s drive to near-outlaw status by letting us know anything can happen tonight, including the loss of teeth, or eyes. The results of the first seven prelim fights are briefly given to us, and we learn, quite sadly, that Pat Smith’s victory has denied us of what would no doubt have been an epic battle between a Ninja and a Wizard.
Awesome.
Bobby Presents 