http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001051313 http://abc26.trb.com/news/natguard08012005,0,4504131.story?coll=wgno-news-1 I'm not going to say anything about this - I'm just going to put the links up and let people read 'em. The noise you hear is me grinding my teeth, but that's all.

So I'm flying out to Seattle tonight. I'll only be gone three days, but they should be pretty packed. Tonight I meet up with The Jackal(tm) for a late dinner. Friday I spend the day at Wizards going over novel stuff and getting the big tour, and then head over to PAX for the weekend. Karin is meeting me Friday night, after she gets out of school. Saturday and Sunday is more PAX, then we fly back to listen to the cats lament about their weekend unsupervised. It's a geeky Tour De Force! Should be a lot of fun.

(I saw this originally at Gizmodo but it was also linked from Boing Boing recently.) Take a look at This Spartan Life. It's a mechanima talk show. So it's a talk show - but it's entirely shot inside Halo 2. They have guests do things like drive in with Warthogs, they take virtual tours of Halo levels while conducting interviews. It's an interesting concept, and it has some genuinely funny moments. Plus - the Solid Gold Elite Dancers. What's not to like? Oh and all the music is done by 8-bit so it's all Game Boy goodness. I'm not convinced right now that it will be sustainable as opposed to just a novelty concept, but the first episode is worth your time.

Has everyone seen the rumor that the 360 will cost over $450 at launch? Hopefully it's just crazy talk because nobody is going to want to pay that. Even though that have that one killer game. You know. That game. That makes you want a 360 at launch. Enough to buy it even though you know it's going to be obseleted by a HD-DVD version later. I truly, truly don't undestand what is going on in Xbox land. I only know one person who seems even vaguely excited and that person is not an early adopter so it doesn't matter. I'd consider a $299 console, but if it comes in over $400 fuck them. That's insane. EDIT: Now the word is that the bare bones is $299 while the pimped version is $399.

I ask that you go listen to this before reading the rest of this post. That's an MP3 link - be prepared for sound. Go on. This is something you'll appreciate more if you hear it cold. Really. You back? That's from here. I can't decide which song is best. Be sure to check out Another Brick in the Wall, I Wanna Be Sedated and Walk on the Wild Side as well. (Thanks Caprice for the link!) In other news my two week extended vacation in Azeroth is over. I'm still enjoying the hell out of WoW with the Knights of Arcadia but it's time to get back to work and not stay up to all hours playing. Well, at least not every night.