Christ, what a crazy past couple of days.
So I was up for about 29 hours this past weekend, from 9 am Saturday to 2 pm Sunday (I should also mention that I got only about 6 hours of sleep the night prior because of the stupid dog). Then I passed out for 14 hours, and woke up at 4 am, which felt pretty damn good. Went to work that Monday morning feeling completely refreshed, which lasted the entire day, despite the fact that everyone was sick and therefore I had to cover multiple bases. Afterwards I went back to Parsons for the award ceremony to learn about the winners of the mobile game mosh and wrap up my the piece for Gama.
One of the guys from Parsons asked me “Hey, did you loose your notebook? We found a Nintendo DS one and we think its yoursa” and when I checked by bookbag, which I really hadn’t done since the mosh, I was shocked to discover that it was indeed missing (I’m super careful about such things, I never loose ANYTHING). My name and contact info is not written anywhere (which he pointed out, and suggested I fix that, and he was totally correct), plus aside from all my extensive notes from the mosh, there’s a ton of other valuable info, mostly related to the book, so thank God (and the fine folks at Parsons) for recovering it for me. And when Katie Salen asked me if I got her email about it, which made me realize that I had neglected to check my email that entire afternoon, only then was it apparent that I hadn’t fully recovered.
Again, I won’t go into the details of the event (that’ll have to wait for the article), but I will say that Steve from MTV News totally pulled through by bringing his DS with the English version of Brain Training as promised. And as expected, it was a lot of fun (especially for something that asks you to do math), despite not doing so hot. I did horrible actually; won’t say what my estimated “brain age” is, though I would like to think my suckiness was because of the fatigue.
Once my business was done there, I jetted off to the Union Square Barnes & Noble where I met up with Katie Skelly, who’s spending her spring break in NYC. Took her to this awesome el-cheapo Mexican joint nearby on 3rd Ave, and we ate burritos while people watching (and made “witty” comments the entire time, of course). Then it was off to Revival for some drinks, which is when Robin joined us.
Now, as anyone who knows me can attest to, it takes next to nothing to get me drunk (cuz I’m Asian and all). In fact, two beers can get me fairly buzzed, but given how exhausted I already was, the effect of just a couple of drinks were even stronger. So feeling a bit tired, I suggested that we head to my place in Brooklyn. And once at my humble abode, I treat both Katie and Robin to a bunch of wacky films, including…
- Spider Man vs. Captain America vs. Santos (you know, the Mexican wrestling legend)
Its from Turkey, and Spider Man is the main bad guy. The best part is the costume: just image what you’re used to seeing, except the blue parts is green and instead of the white parts of the mask, the dude’s eyes are visible, with his incredibly bushy eyebrows sticking out. I only showed them the opening, where Spider Man has his goons bury some poor woman in the sand up to her neck and back a motor boot propeller to her face, ripping it off, but it got the point across.
- Indian Superman
Basically, a Bollywood version of Superman which shamelessly rips off the Hollywood original by stealing scenes, mostly the special effects shots. The rest is a bizarre mixture of action, comedy, and musical numbers (of course). I showed them the best part, which was when Indian Perry White gets diarrhea on a passenger plane, and everyone else on boards laughs at his discomfort of having to wait for the bathroom. Then some terrorists come on board and hijack the plane, but Superman comes saves the day, with the help of his dead father (Indian Jor-El), in some of the awesomest bad special effects this side of an Ed Wood flick.
- Hey Mikey
The same preview DVD I picked up at the New York Comic Con a few weeks back. Had no idea how it was going to fly, but Katie “got it” almost immediately, and Robin warmed up eventually. They both seemed to really dig the episode in which Mikey’s parents trick their son intro drinking milk by set up a fake hostage scenario.
- Jake “The Snake” Roberts: Pick Your Poison
Also showed them a few minutes from the DVD that chronicles the life and career of the pro wrestler known as Jack “the Snake” Roberts. In particular, highlights from Jake’s fued with the Macho Man Randy Savage in which he ties up Savage in middle of the ring with the ring ropes and has a real-life cobra bite him in the arm, which doesn’t let go after a few seconds as planned. So you have a guy named the “Macho Man” who has a snake biting a huge chunk out of his arm, with the other guy trying to pull it off, and on live television, with plenty of close ups of kids’ reactions in the audience. Again, why did I love pro wrestling as a child?
- Karate Ruler
Very few people know about Karate Ruler. It simply defies description, but try to imagine this: a film conceived, written, produced, directed, and starring people who are developmentally disabled. Oh, and its a science fiction odyessy. I got ahold of a copy of this unknown, and impossible to find gem a few years back from an acquaintance who’s friend handled submissions for a film festival and, breaking one of the most important rules, made a copy of it for himself to pass along to his friend, who in turn made me a copy and simply echoed the friend’s sentiment of “Dude…. you HAVE to fucking see this movie.” I’ve shown the film to various friends over the years, and it has pretty much blown every single person’s mind. Given the description, many might think that it sounds like Crispin Glover’s recent cinema foray, What Is It, but to be totally honest, I found that film less scary, as well as less exciting. Yeah, Nazi imagery and snails being salted to death is cool and all, but that doesn’t hold a candle to an intergalactic power struggle, brilliant use of the Windows start up chime, a guy named J J Hoodini and his mentor Doobie Do, wrestling entrance music, and a table that will haunt you forever in your nightmares.
- Taste of Bread
To end the night, and because they wanted to see it, I showed Katie and Robin the film Dave and I made many years back, when we were young and bored in Long Island. Basically, its about monsters going around a small sleepy town and eating everyone. Dave, myself, and Dave’s cousin Dan shared monster duties, which were basically black trash bags, which were extremely comfortable during the shoot, which was during a hot summer weekend, but I also played the hunter who has to rid the town of the menace. I had a gun, a little hat, and a small stuffed bunny companion. Man, those were fun times.
… I ended up giving Robin and Katie the boot around 1, and I got to bed around 2, which meant I had been up for 22 hours. So because I had to get up at 7 for work, I was pretty much a zombie the entire time, and once again, nobody was there due to some bug I guess. Plus, thanks to some bad hot dogs I believe, I began developing some stomach issues in the afternoon. All I wanted by the end of the day was go home and rest, but I had previously rescheduled the “conversation” with my coworker Mark for that evening, which was postponed from a few weeks back. And since I didn’t want to push it back any further, I decided to go on with it, and I’m glad I did, because it turned out to be a fairly awesome thing. Basically, I just sat there and talked about anything I wanted while Mark responded, not with words, but by creating artwork, mostly applying (or throwing) paint at the canvas next to me, or gluing cut outs of people and things from magazines. There’s also a performance element involved, such as how he created makeshift genitals, I suppose in reaction to a sex story from college that I had recounted, or how he started spritzing me with water when I talked about Seattle. The whole thing was filmed, and once Mark is done with the editing, I’ll might try to pass the video of it along here.
Since the session had felt so invigorating, I met up with Katie afterwards in Brooklyn for dinner, some drinks, and Mystery Science Theater 3000. But my stomach problems came back with a vengeance (I think its mostly because I’m exhausted, my body is just not handling things as well as it could), so I didn’t end up really sleeping till around 4. So this time I called out sick from work, but I still managed to make it to the city….
… To pick up my copy of Metal Gear Solid 3 Subsistence Limited Edition at the EB I pre-ordered from, which is due to today. But I was told that it hadn’t arrived yet, and since it was 11 in the morning, the excuse seemed plausible. When I asked about the bonus DVD and if it had already there, or perhaps the day before, the guy I spoke with said it should arrive with the game, but when I brought up how stores all over Manhattan have already received the disc, he made some calls to other EBs and found out that one hadn’t received theirs while another did two weeks ago. So the guy was confused as to what the situation is… perhaps it got delayed or even lost in the mail? Well it is UPS, thought that means info is easy to find out. I’m afraid that its just jackass store employee that took the entire supply when it arrived and put that shit on eBay, which has been running rampant across the country for the past few weeks. Fuck.
I’ve been told to call later in the afternoon to see if they’ve arrived, and if there’s a problem, I bringing Job along with me, who will have with him a video camera, so he can film me going nuts and literally kicking a magazine rack over.*
* That’s a Gaming Age in-joke btw.
