Clash of the Eggnogs: A Holiday Taste Test

Being the jolly curmudgeon that I am, the Christmas season—for me, at least—shouldn't start until (a) it's December, and (b) we've seen snow at least once. There is to be no dancing or prancing in Jingle Bell Square until the air is sufficiently frosty. Figgy pudding is out of the question so long as there's still leftover turkey and stuffing in the fridge. And if I see someone hauling out the holly before Thanksgiving, it makes me want to haul out the shotgun and take aim at their festive inflatable reindeer.

"Humbug," I say. And also, "bah."

Then my wife came home with eggnog as it snowed on Halloween.

Technically, the eggnog came a little sooner, and the snow a little later, but the point is that someone decided that the official beverage of the holiday season (along with snow!) should be available in October. And my wife, who likes eggnog more than she likes my perfectly reasonable decree that the most wonderful time of the year only lasts 2-3 weeks in December, has kept our home stocked with the hit-or-miss libation ever since.

Fortunately for me, she likes to try different brands and varieties. Perhaps you recall my white cheddar burger showdown? Well, for your consideration, here's a review of the many flavors of eggnog (and near-eggnog beverages) that have passed through our fridge this holiday and pre-holiday season:

Stop & Shop Egg Nog
Purchased from: Stop & Shop

Don't let the generic name fool you—take a chance on the ridiculous holiday cow. Striking a satisfyingly sweet balance between eggy and creamy, this is the drink to which other eggnogs should aspire. There's nothing particularly notable about this one, other than that it's good, plain and simple. It doesn't go overboard with its flavor and consistency; by being relatively average, it ends up being above average, if that makes any sense. And if it doesn't make sense, read on, and you'll find how individuality is not necessarily a trait to be coveted in eggnogs.

Verdict: 4/5: Easily drinkable, filling but not heavy, and flat-out tasty.


Tuscan Holiday Eggnog
Purchased from: PathMark

It's...eggnog. Pretty much what I think of when I think eggnog. Coats your throat without being overly thick; more eggy than creamy; has that faint smell of "holiday spices," whatever those are.

Verdict: 3/5: It's fine. It's eggnog.


Borden Eggnog
Purchased from: Stop & Shop

Wait...Borden!? The cheese people?? And it comes in an unrefrigerated box?? There was no way this would be any good.

And it wasn't. It was tolerable at first; nothing more or less than creamy egg glop. No "holiday spices" to speak of. And yes, I did refrigerate it first. After a few sips, that "processed, out-of-a-box" smell quickly gave way to something more foul, like the eggnog had started to spoil in the ninety seconds it had been in my glass.

The texture is what finally got to me—this eggnog is nearly gag-inducingly thick to begin with, but as it coated my throat more and more, it reached a point where it felt like drinking egg-flavored plastic cheese. You know what I mean by "plastic cheese," right? Processed cheese singles...like the kind Borden makes.

Verdict: 0/5: I got through half of the half-glass I'd poured myself before giving up, and I still feel a little sick.


Hood Caramel Eggnog
Purchased from: PathMark

My wife says this one tastes nothing like caramel and everything like melted whipped cream, which is a total fib—the caramel taste here is almost brutish at first. You can smell it: it's like slightly burnt caramel. As far as consistency goes, the melted whipped cream comparison isn't too far off, and I suppose it does taste a bit like whipped cream...buried under layers of caramel that do seem to mellow the more you consume. Whatever it tastes like, it certainly isn't traditional eggnog—though that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Verdict: 3/5: It's pleasant enough. I don't mind caramel, but it's never been a selling point for me, so this is probably the highest score a 'nog like this could get.


Market Pantry Red Chocolate Velvet Holiday Milk
Purchased from: Target

This one was simply too ridiculous to pass up. Red Chocolate Velvet Holiday Milk?? Preposterous.

Delicious.

It was like drinking chocolate pudding with the consistency of Hershey's Milkshake—the latter being my all-time favorite premixed chocolate beverage out of a can, bottle, or carton (at least, until they seemingly changed the recipe a few years ago). This was rich, creamy, chocolatey, velvety, and satisfyingly desserty. Easily a contender for best premixed chocolate beverage I've had.

Verdict: 5/5: If "easily a contender for best premixed chocolate beverage I've had" isn't an endorsement, I don't know what is.


Cream-O-Land Holiday Style Eggnog
Purchased from: Local farmers' market

Look at that carton design. My wife says you can't go wrong with the holiday cow, and I'd say that's true. Though I'm a little suspicious of the "Holiday Style" descriptor; it's sort of like saying "Holiday Style Christmas Carols" or "Lawyer Style Subpoenas."

If you were to take Hood Caramel Eggnog and remove the caramel flavor, this is pretty much what you'd get. Impressively smooth, pleasantly creamy, and not all that eggy. Not unlike drinking melted eggnog-flavored whipped cream.

Verdict: 3/5: Enjoyable, but perhaps too light for its own good; feels like there's something missing. Perhaps that caramel eggnog left more of an impression than I thought.


Farmland Dairies Premium Eggnog
Purchased from: CVS

I see you, impostor holiday cow. You think you're all festive, but in fact, you are not. Do I see a Santa hat? Do I see a wreath in your mouth? No. Where is your holiday style, cow?

I tried valiantly to peg the unusual aroma wafting up from this 'nog, and the closest I could get was "faintly egg-scented garbage masked by cleaning solution" before my wife suggested it smelled like alcohol. Amaretto, Kahlúa, or Bailey's, to be specific. Clearly, I have no idea what I'm talking about. This 'nog is reasonably thick, and the taste is on the eggier side, to be sure, but still creamy. My wife says it gives the impression of being spiked, without actually being spiked. My wife also says she should write her own reviews of these eggnogs.

Verdict: 2/5: This eggnog confuses me. You'll probably like it more if you like the taste of...what did my wife call it, "alcohol"?...but I can do without that.


Dairy Fresh Chocolate Truffle
Purchased from: ShopRite

Chocolate truffle, eh? Well, Dairy Fresh does not disappoint. Another viscous delight in the same puddingy vein as Market Pantry's Red Velvet Holiday Milk, though the first sip or two reminded me of regular chocolate milk—at least, the way I make regular chocolate milk, which is chocolate syrup and possibly a splash of milk. This really does taste and feel like a melted chocolate truffle.

Verdict: 4/5: Not quite decadent, per se, but certainly more of a dessert than a beverage proper. And a very tasty dessert at that.


Organic Valley Organic Eggnog
Purchased from: ShopRite

Finally. While Tuscan Holiday Eggnog is what I expect when I have eggnog, Redundant Valley Eggnog is what I hope for when I have eggnog. It's like drinking milk, but thicker, and more on the vanilla ice cream side of dairy flavors. The ingredients list suggests that "organic fair trade nutmeg" is the source of the hint those elusive holiday spices here.

Verdict: 4/5: Delightful. I don't know whether the "organic" bit is what makes the difference, but I certainly wouldn't mind more eggnogs like this.


Hood Limited Edition Sugar Cookie Eggnog
Purchased from: ShopRite

So far, I am very impressed with Hood's ability to accurately convey what their eggnogs taste like. (Or, conversely, succeed at making their eggnogs taste like what they want to name them.) This one is nothing short of liquid sugar cookie. I'm beginning to think that "eggnog" is just a code word for specialty beverages that would otherwise be too novel for most people to take a chance on.

Verdict: 5/5: It's just as desserty as the Dairy Fresh Chocolate Truffle, but not so thick and rich that it strays from being a traditional beverage. Addictive.


Dairy Fresh Red Velvet
Purchased from: ShopRite

Is there actually a market for more than one brand of red velvet holiday beverage? Perhaps...but as far as I'm concerned, not while Market Pantry is still in business. This one actually tastes like red velvet cake, which puts it at a disadvantage—I'll eat red velvet cake, but I'm not a fan. Excessive frosting usually ruins a cake for me, and red velvet anything (at least in my experience) is characterized by excessive frosting—even when it's poured into a cup. There's enough of that essence of red velvet (both in smell and taste) to give the impression of the cake portion of this equation, but it's that too-sweet frosting flavor that wants to run the show here.

Verdict: 2/5: If you're a fan of red velvet, bump that score up a point. For me, it's too much like the frosting and not enough like the cake.


Turkey Hill Egg Nog
Purchased from: ShopRite

It's...eggnog. Think Tuscan Holiday Eggnog, but switch out the "holiday spices" for a stronger scent of egg.

Verdict: 2/5: This one's pretty average as far as eggnogs go, but the smell matters a great deal now that I'm an eggnog snob.


So Delicious Dairy Free Nog Coconut Nog Milk Beverage
Purchased from: Stop & Shop

Well, it's about time that someone 'fesses up that there is, in fact, no egg in their eggnog. So, it's just called nog. The Ferengi would be proud. I would be proud, too, except (a) I can't deal with the ridiculously long and silly name, and (b) it's not very good! I am perhaps not the right audience for this drink, because I like my dairy, and I've always found coconut milk to be a little too strong for my tastes. The texture and flavor are that of a milkshake made of coconut pudding and coconut milk that's somehow non-dairy.

Verdict: 1/5: If you're lactose-intolerant or cuckoo for coconuts, give this an extra point or two; I, for one, could not stop making faces while drinking this. I think using the Scotty glass was appropriate for this one.


Southern Comfort Traditional Egg Nog
Purchased from: ShopRite

If you would've asked me last year which brand of eggnog was the best, I would've told you without hesitation that it was Southern Comfort. After consuming more eggnog in the past few months that I've consumed in the last decade, I'm not so sure anymore. This is a proper eggnog—thick, balanced evenly between creamy and eggy, gently wafting "holiday spices" into the nostrils as the glass is drawn near to the nose (or mouth, or however you drink your eggnog)—but after my experiences this season, I've concluded that I'd rather have an improper eggnog that makes little or no attempt to live up to the "egg" part of its namesake.

Don't get me wrong—Southern Comfort is good, and it's still one of the best eggnogs around. I suspect that I'm simply suffering from overexposure, and it doesn't help that I had this directly after a glass of the So Not Delicious Absurdly Convoluted Title Coconut Milk Drink Beverage Nog.

Verdict: 4/5: A hearty, quality eggnog. Be sure to keep an eye out for the vanilla-flavored variant; I couldn't find it this year, but that extra touch of creamy sweetness makes this eggnog even better.


Closing Thoughts

Folks, I am officially eggnogged out...and I haven't even scratched the surface of what's out there. Hood alone has a few more special flavors to try, and that's to say nothing of all the regional brands and offerings from local dairy farms.

To recap, here's the list from best to worst:

Highly recommended:
- Hood Limited Edition Sugar Cookie Eggnog
- Market Pantry Red Chocolate Velvet Holiday Milk

Recommended:
- Dairy Fresh Chocolate Truffle
- Stop & Shop Egg Nog
- Southern Comfort Traditional Egg Nog
- Organic Valley Organic Eggnog

Pretty decent:
- Cream-O-Land Holiday Style Eggnog
- Hood Caramel Eggnog
- Tuscan Holiday Eggnog

Probably not worth it:
- Dairy Fresh Red Velvet
- Farmland Dairies Premium Eggnog
- Turkey Hill Egg Nog

Definitely not worth it:
- So Delicious Dairy Free Nog Coconut Nog Milk Beverage

BLEAUGH—for the person on your Naughty list this Christmas:
- Borden Eggnog

We'd love to hear from you if you've got a different opinion on these drinks, some recommendations of your own, or some horror stories about eggnogs and "holiday milks" to avoid. Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and happy...erm...eggnog consumption.

Mega Man 25th Anniversary Livestreaming Marathon: A Retrospective

To celebrate Mega Man's 25th anniversary in style, I got together with my longtime friend (codename Dash Jump) and my wife (alias Z-Saber) to stream over 20 continuous hours of Mega Man over the Internet, with viewers from all around the world tuning in at various times to join in the fun. What began as a televised second helping of my 2010 Mega Man marathon soon became a more massive undertaking and learning experience than I had ever expected.

Our marathon comprised Rockman 1-6 for the Famicom (both because we'd never played the original Japanese versions of the NES games, and because the Famicom A/V was easier to stream from), Mega Man 7 for the SNES, Mega Man 8 for the PS1, and Mega Man 9-10 for the Wii. If you missed any part of the marathon, or if you'd like to relive the memories, pay a visit to any of the links below—the whole thing is saved there for future generations to look at it and say, "What were you guys thinking!?"

- Dash's Twitch TV channel
- Dash's Megathon playlist on his YouTube channel
- My Collaborations playlist on my YouTube channel

I'm giving Dash all the credit here [Dash's note: I accept all the credit!]—I might've come up with the idea, but he's the one who provided the hardware and expertise that allowed us to stream ten different games on four different consoles from the comfort of my living room. Not only that, but he did an excellent job of moderating the viewer chat room—something I mostly gave up on after I started getting a headache from looking back and forth between the gameplay on my television and the text scrolling by on his laptop.

I also was pleased and grateful to have my wife there throughout the first nine games; she, too, kept on top of the chat room, and was even a good enough sport to play a stage or two when the fans requested it. Additionally, she volunteered to make pizza from scratch when dinnertime drew near. (It was delicious, I might add.)

I mentioned this was both a learning experience and a more massive undertaking than anticipated; perhaps the best way to illustrate what I mean is with a few lists.


What went well:

-  Technology! We actually managed to pull this off with no significant technical difficulties, unlike the first time I tried to record Mega Man videos. This is why Dash is the man. [Dash's note: Agreed; he is also handsome and single.]

- Publicity! Not only did Dash find numerous opportunities in the chat room, in the commentary, and in the video footage (with pre-created images posted between games) to advertise our Twitter accounts, but my efforts to plug the marathon on Exfanding, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter were very successful in drawing more of a crowd to advertise to in the first place. [Dash's note: We love you; please follow!]

- Breaks! When one of us needed to eat or step out of the room for whatever reason, the other could keep playing to cover for us, so there was seldom a break in the action. This also helped limit the amount of down time between games; aside from swapping out cartridges and systems, we rarely needed more than a minute or two until we were ready to roll again.

- Commentary! We were, at various times, thoughtful, insightful, clever, funny, and generally entertaining. Even as the marathon dragged on and we slogged through the games and stages we weren't as fond of, we often managed to stay chatty and keep a positive attitude (or at least sound like we had a positive attitude).

- Responsiveness! Between the three of us, someone was always monitoring the chat room, and we tended to be very good about responding to the questions and requests of our viewers.

- Gameplay! There was a solid mix of impressive success and hilariously embarrassing failure in our playing, with plenty of fun, tense, and enlightening moments interspersed between the biggest highlights. [Dash's note: I have a keen sense for dodging into pits and spikes.]

- Food! We had breakfast, lunch, and (to a lesser extent) dinner planned out in advance, with plenty to drink and snack on whenever we needed it. [Dash's note: Except chocolate ice cream, because Gemini hoarded it all.]

- Participation! All three of us were frequently and meaningfully involved in various aspects of the marathon.

- Completion! We actually beat all ten games. How 'bout that.

What could have gone better:

- Starting! We told everyone we'd begin around 8:00 AM; we started closer to 8:20 AM. That's not too far off when you're talking about an all-day marathon, but we probably could have put up the "preloader" screen in time for the people who showed up early to be reassured that this was still happening.

- Alertness! I was apparently still groggy and especially off my game through Rockman 1-2, and it took Dash a few hours until he realized he hadn't had his coffee. Needless to say, our performance at the beginning, while still entertaining, often left something to be desired. It took us 25 minutes just to beat Ice Man's stage—which, I might point out, is how long it took us to beat all five of the preceding robot masters combined. This prompted our favorite recurring gag of the marathon, a series of Zelda II-inspired "GAME OVER RETURN OF ICE MAN" images that stemmed from the chat room's response to our world-condemning failures. [Dash's note: Ice Man has haunted my dreams since Monday.]

- Expectations and timing! My previous marathon—which was interrupted for 45 minutes by an unexpected errand, had a few longer breaks, and involved me collecting basically all the optional bolts in Mega Man 8—clocked in at about 16 hours. Even allowing 17 hours for this marathon would surely be more than sufficient, bringing the event to a close by around 1:00 AM at the latest. That's late, to be sure, but not an hour at which either of us is unaccustomed to being functional.

We ended at 4:00 AM. Our breaks between games were almost nonexistent, we skipped half the bolts in Mega Man 8, and we finished three hours later than the latest I was prepared for.

Our original plan was to have me be the primary player for all ten games, with Dash occasionally jumping in on the games he was more experienced with. While classic Mega Man and platformers in general are my specialty (and the ten games we marathoned were still fresh in my mind from my YouTube videos and my 2010 marathon), Dash is better at the Mega Man X series and other genres of games. [Dash's note: True dat.] I think we both recognized that, while it might be more fun to share the marathon equally, things would probably flow better if I covered for Dash on the games he'd only played once, or too long ago to remember well.

Neither of us discussed changing the plan. When I kept offering him the controller after beating a stage, and he kept accepting, the marathon transformed from a relaxed speedrun of Mega Man 1-10 into a casual "Let's Play" of Mega Man 1-10 with no definite endpoint. The whole point was to have fun playing these games together, but I was so focused on how far behind schedule we were that I could barely let either of us enjoy the marathon fully. It wasn't long before I started hammering Dash with unwelcome, unsolicited advice [Dash's note: And don't forget the rolled-up newspaper!] about how to get through each stage more quickly, and even my theater background couldn't mask my unhappiness with fighting Clown Man after my bedtime.

Lessons learned:

- Understand the person or people with whom you're collaborating, and be attentive to their mood, playing style, and gaming ability. Create a plan, agree on the plan, stick to the plan. Clearly communicate your expectations to each other, and clearly express when things aren't meeting your expectations or going as planned. [Dash's note: Is this marriage advice?] I could go into more detail here, but suffice it to say that almost everything that could've gone better with the marathon was the result of us doing the opposite of everything mentioned above.

- For future marathons, Mega Man & Bass should be played in place of Mega Man 8. Unrelenting difficulty be darned! Anything's gotta be better than...well, pretty much everything about that game.

- Unless it's an intentionally blind playthrough or a spontaneous decision to play a particular game, spend a little time before the marathon/livestream practicing or reading up on the game(s) you're going to play. This is especially important if there are known trouble spots—dodging the shots of Mega Man 7's final boss, for example, or the labyrinth sections of Astro Man's stage in Mega Man 8.

- I am not cut out for livestreaming on my own; this would have been a complete disaster without Dash. [Dash's note: Most things are a complete disaster without Dash.] Simultaneously monitoring the chat room, providing commentary, actually playing a game, periodically advertising my various social media accounts, and ensuring the technology still works is not something I can see myself happily or competently doing.

- Never forget how awesome your viewers are. A handful of people spent the entire 20 hours with us. Some of our viewers went to bed, and came back seven or eight hours later to see if we were still playing. We had people digging up articles, video links, and even creating custom images for us on the fly. It didn't matter that we scored dozens of Game Overs or accidentally had to replay half of the castle stages in Mega Man 9; our viewers were there for us, and that's a magnificent feeling.

Overall, despite the fatigue, failure, and frustration I know we both suffered at certain points (GAME OVER RETURN OF ICE MAN), I'd say the Megathon (as Dash likes to call it) was a great success. We provided the Internet with 20 more hours of entertainment, Dash's livestreaming career is off to a strong start [Dash's note: Thanks, Gemini!!!], we both gained more subscribers and followers, and we got to celebrate Mega Man's 25th anniversary in style, among friends both near and far.

Now, to start planning that Mega Man Game Boy marathon...

Street Fighter X Mega Man = 25

So this happened over the weekend:



Now, let's go back for a minute to 2010, to my reaction to Capcom's last official mainstream installment of the Mega Man series: "Because I'm a hopeless Mega Man fanatic, and because I wanted to write a truly comprehensive review of Mega Man 10, I made it a point to play the game into the ground—at this point, I hope it stays buried there a while." I left the game with the satisfaction of having blown stuff up real good, and with the disappointment of my favorite video game franchise heading off in a direction more appealing to hip, young gamers and people who hated everything after Mega Man 3.

Part of me is looking forward to this new game, assuming it's not some sort of belated April Fools' gag—it appears that whoever's responsible knows what makes a Mega Man game fun, and loves Street Fighter enough to pull off a worthy crossover.

The other part of me is saying, "Really? This is how we're celebrating Mega Man's 25th anniversary—with another Street Fighter game?"

In other words, I don't really care. Or, at least, I've given up on caring.

Capcom announced Mega Man Universe, then pulled the plug on it, and I really didn't mind. Same deal with Mega Man Legends 3—though, I have yet to play any of the Legends series, so perhaps I should have been enraged. Then there was Mega Man Xover, the sad-looking iOS game that no one in the fan community seemed to want to play. Now we've got yet another crossover. Yes, people love crossovers when they're done right. Yes, it looks like this one will be done right. No, I'm not enthusiastic about it. I'm tired of my favorite series being dragged in every direction but the one that actually matters to me.

I don't want a level editor for Mega Man 2 that looks like a Flash game, or a messy mashup of multiple Mega Man series that looks like a Flash game, or a crossover of two completely unrelated series that looks like it was originally intended to be a Flash game. Those are all good fodder for a fangame or three, but it raises some questions about the future of the franchise when Mega Man 11 and its hypothetical brethren are ignored for over two years while these other games are touted as The Next Big Thing. Crossovers, cameos, and out-of-continuity spinoffs are fun in moderation, but Zero's appearance in Tatsunoko vs. Capcom is no substitute for Mega Man X9.

What's reassuring to me is the last line of the announcement article: "We know it's been a hard year for Mega Man fans, but I hope this proves our love and intent to the series, and that we have not heard the last of the little guy." In the wake of the physical and economic devastation Japan suffered last year, along with the departure of Keiji Inafune, it's understandable that Capcom has needed some time to regroup and figure out what, if anything, they should be doing with this franchise. I still wasn't entirely pleased with where things were headed before that, but I'm willing to accept that these past few years have been a time of transition. Perhaps this new game is just to hold us over until The Real Next Big Thing comes along later next year.

All I ask for are upbeat music, plot and dialogue that at least make sense, new challenges, new weapons, AND THE CHARGE AND SLIDE BACK THANKYOUVERYMUCH. As long as I can get a new Mega Man game like that every couple of years—or if they finally bring one or more of the existing series to a satisfying conclusion—then I suppose I don't mind the occasional "fluff game," especially one that looks to be as promising as Street Fighter X Mega Man.

Unless they keep making games for iOS, in which case I'll never be able to play them.

Star Trek Into Darkness of the Movie Theater Again

Well, this came out today.



Now, let's go back for a minute to 2009, to my reaction to the first movie in this new continuity: "The movie was amazing...but it wasn't Star Trek." I left the theater with the satisfaction of having seen stuff blow up real good IN SPAAAAAAAAACE, and with the disappointment of my favorite entertainment franchise heading off in a direction more appealing to hip, young Star Wars fans than curmudgeonly, fun-hating Star Trek fans like me.

Part of me is looking forward to this new movie—crashing the Enterprise into downtown San Francisco looks like it should be cool, and I'll finally be able to determine whether this new direction was worth four years of aggravatingly conflicting emotions.

The other part of me doesn't really care.

You know I've still only seen the previous movie once? On opening day, in the theater. That's it. I've seen Star Trek: Nemesis at least four times—willingly, no less. I think that says something about where my loyalties lie. I'd rather watch bad Star Trek than a good movie pretending to be Star Trek.

Though, really, I'm no longer sure the previous movie was all that good to begin with. And after more intense scrutiny, Nemesis doesn't seem as bad, either.

I read through all of "Star Trek by the Minute," a series of 117 blog posts analyzing the science, moviecraft, and faithfulness to the Trek name of every single minute of the 2009 Star Trek film. I watched Cowboys & Aliens, a film written by the same guys who wrote Star Trek. I continued my ongoing endeavor to watch every episode of every official Star Trek series with several seasons of Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager. I chatted about the film with Morgan Gendel, writer of (among others) TNG's famous episode "The Inner Light."

I've had plenty of time to think about the 2009 film, and plenty of opportunities to pick it apart and compare it to other movies and other Trek. I've reached the conclusion that the action sequences, special effects, music, and novelty of having the original Star Trek back on the big screen have successfully masked some very serious flaws with the storytelling, and deflected attention off of the heart of the movie, which is so fundamentally different from what has traditionally made Star Trek...well, Star Trek.

There have been bad films and bad episodes that haven't really felt like Star Trek, or haven't lived up to the standard of quality established by the likes of Wrath of Khan and "The Best of Both Worlds." Even with the wrong director at the helm or a sub-par script to work with, someone involved in any given Star Trek production was trying to keep Gene Roddenberry's vision of the future alive. If this new movie trailer is any indication, it looks to me like J.J. Abrams wants to recreate Star Trek in his own image.

Time for spoilers, kiddos.

From the press release: "When the crew of the Enterprise is called back home, they find an unstoppable force of terror from within their own organization has detonated the fleet and everything it stands for, leaving our world in a state of crisis. With a personal score to settle, Captain Kirk leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a one man weapon of mass destruction. As our heroes are propelled into an epic chess game of life and death, love will be challenged, friendships will be torn apart, and sacrifices must be made for the only family Kirk has left: his crew."

So, let's think about that while we consider what was destroyed in the first film, and what will probably be destroyed in the second one: Spock's mother. Kirk's father. Vulcan. Starfleet. "Friendships," whatever those are. (I'm already blaming Uhura.) Possibly even the Enterprise itself. And that's not to mention the Prime timeline's Romulus, along with 40+ years of continuity.

Kinda looks like he's gunning for a totally blank slate where the characters are the only things identifiable as being from Star Trek. Who's the villain in this one? Not an iconic alien like a Klingon or imported-from-another-timeline Romulan. Though, that is not to say the villain might not be iconic—that is, i-Khan-ic.

What I'm hoping for: Those parasitic mind-control grubs from the TNG episode "Conspiracy" finally make their grand return, infiltrating Starfleet Command under the watchful eye of a lesser-known villain from the annals of Star Trek history.

What I'm expecting: KHAAAAAAAAAN!!!!

There can still be mind-control grubs, though.

We'll see how this one turns out—without the oppressive shackles of loosely observed continuity shaping the direction of the story, J.J. Abrams and Co. are free to do absolutely anything they want with this film.

Things We'll Probably See:
- Nurse Chapel, whose only function is to scream at scary things, and give McCoy somebody to talk to, 'cuz he really doesn't seem that tight with Kirk
- An impromptu Gorn battle that completely interrupts the flow of the story
- Vulcans behaving completely out of character
- A reference to a classic Trek scene or quote, which inadvertently devalues the scene or quote if you think about it too hard
- LENS FLARE
- An incredibly important plot point that's barely explained and/or makes absolutely no sense if you think about it too hard
- Adults who are absolutely useless in crisis situations, leaving the young'uns to take matters into their own hands
- Petty bickering over a woman (I'm already blaming Uhura)
- Someone getting killed off for plot convenience and/or a cheap emotional response
- No Klingons, or worse yet, pointless Klingons
- Really awesome action sequences that make you forget about everything I just mentioned

Despite my cynicism, I'm open-minded enough to give Star Trek Into Darkness a chance. Skyfall was enough to rekindle my enthusiasm for the James Bond franchise after Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace took it in a direction I wasn't overly excited about; all it takes is one movie.

Though, given how downplayed the words "STAR TREK" are on the movie poster, I doubt Into Darkness will help me see the light.

Thanksgiving; or, Why Not to Write About Thanksgiving

I'm sometimes reluctant to post anything topical when a holiday or other commemorative event rolls around, if it's just for the sake of posting something topical—it's not that holiday posts are bad, per se, but they make annoying our readers even easier than usual. For example:

- Distinctly US holidays such as Thanksgiving have the potential to alienate our international readers (you may recall that one person from Romania who navigated here by accident that one time);

- Religious holidays such as Easter aren't celebrated by everyone, and even if they were, I'd still be wary of helping oversaturate the public consciousness with the only thing that anyone is able to talk about that day (or that half of the year, if we're talking Christmas);

- Valentine's Day and other romantic celebrations (such as wedding anniversaries) remind your unhappiest single readers how lonely, bitter, jealous, and/or emotionally vulnerable they're feeling;

- Any day that, simply by mentioning it, means you have to pick sides—I can't just say that it's Veterans Day; I need to condone or condemn war in the same breath, which will divide readers, or else people will start making assumptions about my beliefs based on what I don't say, so I need to write a longwinded explanation that honors our veterans while even-handedly respecting both viewpoints about war, which will still aggravate some people;

- Tax Day.

 I could go on, but even posts about how posts about holidays can be obnoxious, can be obnoxious. Like that last sentence.

Exfanding tradition dictates that, unless we've got a full-blown post in mind, we should find a comic book cover relevant to the holiday that we want to recognize, maybe throw in a famous quote, and call it a day. Well, if you can overlook the fact that I forgot Halloween and blew my chance to write about the Fake Election this year, I'm not one to argue with tradition.

So, in the traditional Exfanding style, allow me to wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving!

Why are they playing Christmas music already?
-Me

Image from www.coverbrowser.com.

Early Resolutions, Belated Solutions

Perhaps it's a little too early to be making resolutions for 2013 (or a little too late, depending on when you're reading this), but I think I'd like to spend less time making videos.

I know; I know. I'm the guy who makes videos like this, explaining why I'm not making videos. It's not even conceivable that I could spend less time making videos. Allow me to elaborate: by 2013, I'd like YouTube to be an occasional hobby instead of an ongoing creative project. Like it used to be.

When I started making videos for YouTube, I'd come home from work, do some recording before dinner, and dedicate a Saturday or Sunday afternoon to wrapping up whatever I couldn't finish during the week. I was finishing entire video series in a matter of what, a month? Three, tops? I started playing Space Quest 0 this past July, recorded all the video footage in something like two days, sat down to record all the commentary for each video in 1-2 takes, and it's now November and I've got at least two more videos to go.

Wha happen??

Video recording, like so many of my other things I've tried to work on this past year, became relegated to a routine to ensure that it wouldn't fall by the wayside. The trouble is, when you're making video recording, blogging, writing for GameCola, watching anime, watching movies, watching TV shows, playing video games, reading books, reading comic books...insert another two dozen examples here...part of your routine, you don't really get much of anything done.

I should know better: When I commit to a project, I follow through on it. I don't need to keep chipping away at it every day or every few days to keep from losing momentum; I just need to want to do it in the first place. I started an FAQ/Walkthrough for the PC game Jetpack back in 2008, a few months before the founding of this blog. I added new content off and on throughout the next year, published what I had...and got busy with other things.

Three and a half years later, I picked up where I left off.

My YouTube moniker was selected because it's a Mega Man weapon I like, and because everything else I could think of was already taken...but truly is fitting: GeminiLaser, the one that moves slowly but always bounces back. In my heart, I'm not really a YouTuber. I never intended to make more than a handful of videos. Now I've got 4,161 subscribers and 1,094,078 video views, and that's just for my personal channel alone—that doesn't cover any of the collaborations or contributions I've made for other channels. I've become a thing.

Would I like to continue making videos? Sure. But pretending I'm always working on a video is a drag. I'm a marathon man. I write short poetry, not novels. I do my best work when I can shut out the world for a few hours and stay totally focused on one thing. I have a long short-term attention span, and a short long-term attention span. Prolonging the completion of a video or video series I'm allegedly working on is just delaying the gratification.

Either I'm working on it, and having fun, or I'm not working on it, and having fun doing something else. No more of this in-between business; saying I'm working on a video and having little or nothing to show for it is tantamount to failure. It's like joining a football team and wandering off the field mid-game to compose a symphony—it might be a magnificent symphony, but you're a failure as a football player. I'm tired of subconsciously dragging myself down because I'm not achieving the things I'm not making a priority to achieve. When the opportunity and motivation arise, I'll make another video. Until then, I'm going on a YouTube hiatus.

Remember the last time I went on hiatus? I stepped away from the blog for two weeks, and when I came back, I felt better about writing than I had in months. Whether it's two days or two years before I get back to recording videos, I'm convinced it'll be worth the wait...and even if it isn't, I'll be happier for it.

Return to October Country

Here we are again. It's October. Halloween season. Election season.

Tough to say which is scarier, really.

For me, October is where I rely on other people to tell me the leaves are beautifully changing colors, because I'm color-blind. October is where I break out the comfy jacket to go along with the long sleeves I've been wearing for as much of the summer as I could tolerate. October is where I start thinking about plans for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and in doing so, realize I've once again forgotten my mother's birthday.

For this blog, October is always a time of anticipation and storytelling. There are conventions. There was even a Renaissance Faire, that one time. But more than anything else, October is home. Not for me, but for my absent blogging buddy, Alex. A few years back, he wrote about this time of year—"The October Country," as Ray Bradbury called it—and ever since, I haven't been able to think about it any other way.

Even though this country is the next one over from the one I call home.

Personally, I'm holding out for the turkey and mistletoe. I've always preferred hockey over football, sleigh rides over hayrides, and Classic Holiday Movie over The One Where Stupid Kids Get Killed Stupidly Because They're Stupid IV: This Time, With More Knives. Yet the earnest enthusiasm that Alex, my wife, and others have for this season starts to rub off after a while, and I find myself starting to appreciate aspects of this month that I previously thought little about or avoided altogether. I think, especially right now, October is good for my health.

I could use a change of season. Physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, I could use a change of season. Fresh faces, fresh side projects, fresh air—fresh baked goods would do nicely, too, but I won't beg. This creature of habit is longing for a break from his routine, which means I need a change of season.

Even if it's nothing more than an excuse to finally watch Bubba Ho-tep this year, I'm looking forward to this trip through October Country.

Weathering the Storm

I can already see the intro to this month's Month in Review post: "After two months of minimal e-mail contact with my blogging partner and one brief collaboration to reiterate that this is still our blog, I gave up on new content and just let other people write for Exfanding instead."

Look at what's been posted so far this month, and you'll see what I mean. Two guest posts, a post about guest posts, a list post I'd expected to be quick and easy (which, of course, took longer than expected), and the kind of sad filler post I swore I wouldn't be writing anymore. I am grateful for Joseph and Daniel's enthusiasm to contribute this month, because otherwise, I'm not sure I'd even be writing a post today.

Alex and I always used to marvel at how long this blog has lasted compared to the vast majority of other blogs out there. I've come to realize that the driving factor behind our successful self-perpetuation has been collaboration, plain and simple. Yes, we love to write; yes, we've got plenty of things we want to write about. There are so many other forums for us, though--message boards, social media, other websites we contribute content to, personal journals, even regular conversations independent of a digital medium allow us to express ourselves. We can geek out anywhere, and we can write in so many places. Exfanding never had a monopoly on any of that, but what has always set it apart is that it's been our place to geek out. Not mine, and not his, but ours. The fact that we have anybody reading our material is just a surprising bonus.

That's why blogging has felt so hollow to me as of late--I'm still treating this as our blog, not my blog, which after two months of writing solo is like eating alone at a dinner for two. At an empty restaurant, no less. Last week, I put up a Facebook poll about what I should do for the next Sunday Spotlight--91 people saw it; only three people responded.

It's not about the numbers. It's never been about the numbers. But the numbers still matter. And in the midst of my other side projects, among other places to direct my creative energies, after weeks of not even knowing if my own blogging buddy was still reading what I wrote, the importance of this blog had begun to slip for me--and the numbers were merely confirming that nobody really cared.

I realize that's unfair to the people who do care. It's unfair to the valiant three who did vote on that silly poll. It's unfair to Alex, who, my wife assures me, is still reading the blog (or who's planning to get caught up once things settle down next month).

I was already in a "nothing really matters" mindset after dragging myself through the last several episodes of Madlax, an anime series that starts off with guns blazing and exciting action, quickly slows down (oxymoronic, isn't it?) to explore some mysteries and political intrigue, picks up with the action again, and then throws everything that matters out the window because [spoiler] nothing really matters. Having my wife frown at me for feeling less than exuberant over yet another anime series she liked didn't help the situation.

On top of all that, everything I've been working on for the past several weeks has been a long-term project--playing through the Tribunal expansion pack of The Elder Scrolls III; trying to complete my gargantuan episode guide to Star Trek: The Next Generation for the show's 25th anniversary this month (which I ain't gonna finish in time); picking up the pace on recording and releasing Space Quest 0 videos for YouTube so I can return to my Mega Man 7 playthrough; compiling staff responses for each huge installment of GameCola's Most Essential/Influential Games list; writing more of the quest for my GameCola D&D group--and the completionist in me feels like I'm not doing anything with my life if I'm only chipping away at tasks instead of finishing them, no matter how fun they may be to chip away at.

Especially when the only comments I've been getting on my YouTube channel as of late have been, "wen next video b dun?"

Yet all it took was a successful D&D session and a guest post or two to rekindle my enthusiasm for writing here. Some legitimate collaboration to break me out of my lonely solo side project mentality. Some in-depth human interaction to validate my efforts and remind me how much I love sharing these side projects, regardless of how many people I'm sharing them with. I swear I've written about this same kind of circumstance at least once before on the blog, but even if I haven't, the lesson is a familiar one.

I think I've weathered the storm. The dark clouds are parting, and I can see the sun peeking in again. Though we've got only half a crew yet, the waters are calm, and it's looking clear all the way to the horizon...and in the distance, I think I spy a castaway with a self-published children's book in hand. Whatever the future may bring, for now, we're still sailing.

Thanks for hanging on, Exfanders.

Exfanding Your Horizons Turns 4 Years Old!

It's official: Exfanding Your Horizons is four years old! Happy birthday to us!

Because it's now a tradition, we'll be following in the blogsteps of the last three years with a Q&A format guaranteed to please new readers and longtime Exfanders alike. (DISCLAIMER: That's just talk; we guarantee nothing.) Due to various circumstances, this year we've condensed the list from ten questions down to five. There's probably DLC already on the disc for the other five questions, though, so it's not like we're totally gypping you.

Our blog rules.


Hey...didn't there used to be two guys writing this blog?

NATHANIEL: Um...there did used to be two of us. It just occurred to me that perhaps I didn't back up the Alex Posts Stuff widget before I asked my HTML-savvy wife to do most of the work overhauling the blog, because I haven't seen him since.

ALEX: *Crawls out from under his rock, locks around, sees shadow, thinks about heading back under his rock.*


This past year, in an effort to minimize filler and still continue to write amidst everything else going on in your lives, you introduced a new weekly column and several revisions and reductions to the regular posting schedule. For the last six weeks, one of you has been blogging solo while the other has been completely occupied with other endeavors. How do you feel about all that?

ALEX: It certainly wasn’t the ideal for me to stop writing for the blog, but unfortunately, it was (and, sadly, still is) a necessary evil. I’ve pretty much stopped sleeping in an effort to extend the day, so sitting down to write up an Exfanding post should theoretically be something I can handle. And yet, apparently I cannot.

Handle writing an Exfanding post, that is.

I actually just got back from a week in LA for work, and this week has been nonstop crazy as I try to finish off everything that’s due. There is a light at the end of the tunnel, though, and I honestly do hope to be back to the blog pretty soon.

NATHANIEL: Hey, you're here now, and that means a lot. Writing solo for a two-person blog is like performing without your co-star when the marquee clearly says "[pick one: Laurel and Hardy / Abbott and Costello / The Blues Brothers / Jay and Silent Bob / Penn and Teller / etc.]." You can make references to the other person, and carry on with the same kind of material as usual, but after a certain point it's almost disingenuous to work as a one-person duo.

It honestly feels like a different blog now than it did a month ago. Yes, the new look is part of it. But I think what was most jarring to me was spending a couple of years posting every single day virtually without exception, and then suddenly looking at the blog one day to see that it'd been just me posting two or three things per week. That all happened over the course of less than a month, and I don't think either of us expected things to be so drastic or last so long.

It'd be one thing if we'd just decided to pursue other projects, and I ended up starting up a blog of my own, but Exfanding has always been about collaboration. I find myself missing the joint posts and the theme weeks and the daily back-and-forth e-mail banter that we had before things got busy for us--and I miss having Alex's posts to read. Like I said two years ago, I'm a fan of Exfanding.

All that being said, there's still been a lot of good to come out of the changes we've made to accommodate both our crazy schedules. Sunday Spotlight has rejuvenated my focus on sharing new fandoms, which is ostensibly what this blog is all about. By relaxing our self-imposed posting deadlines, I've been able to take my time on writing the kinds of long, rambly posts I like best. Consequently, that occasional feeling of, "Aw, I need to write a blog post tonight," has all but disappeared, and the number of new "favorite posts" I've been able to write will make our Year in Review for 2012 even more of a challenge, assuming we get to our 2011 edition before then.


Whether it was Flashback Week, being on a Konami kick, the epic tale of the wedding saga, New York Comic-Con/Anime Festival, the ups and downs of self-publishing, or your latest D&D quest, you've told a lot of stories in the last twelve months. You've also been a bit more outspoken, reflective, ranty, and soapboxy than usual. Where do you see your writing going over the course of the next year?

ALEX: Hopefully on the blog.

No, really. I don’t care what I’m writing about; I just want to have the time to write for the blog again.

NATHANIEL: Well, if Alex will be writing again, then maybe I won't take over his Waiting for Wednesday column and talk every week about all the comics on my shelf that I picked up ages ago but haven't gotten around to reading yet.

Actually, that idea's not half bad...

::ahem::  I'm looking forward to taking a break from sprawling stories than span multiple posts. Writing them is fun, but it's also exhausting, especially when you get up to seven or eight parts. I've always been a short story and poetry kind of guy, and these things keep turning into novellas, so I'll be striving to find new ways to keep my storytelling concise. I'm hoping to maintain and expand the variety of topics I cover as well; I mean, off the top of my head, I can't even think of the last time I mentioned Mega Man.


Got any big, geeky plans we can look forward to hearing about in the near future?

NATHANIEL: Once The Avengers comes out on video in late September, you can bet I'll be hosting a 13-hour movie marathon of everything the Marvel Cinematic Universe has to offer so far.

Now that I've already brought up Mega Man once in this post, I can also mention that I'll be doing something for the Blue Bomber's 25th anniversary in December. If I can swing it, I'll do a streaming livecast marathon over the Internet, but I make no promises because I'm not even sure if "a streaming livecast over the Internet" is the proper terminology for what I'm thinking of, let alone something I've got the technology or know-how to properly pull off. I might have to get one or two of my tech-smart friends involved.

Alex, I know you've got something exciting planned.

ALEX: Yes! I have spent the past several days piled under printer files for my forthcoming children’s book, which is scheduled to be on sale the first week of October.

Aside from that, I’ve also started work on a comic book for which I’ve hired a really kicking artist. We plan on completing the entire first issue, then posting it (for free) on KickStarter in an effort to get people to pay for the rest of the series. It’ll be a four-issue mini, and it’s an idea I’ve toyed with for a while now.

Hmmm…what else? Oh! I’m going to the Baltimore Comic Con in an effort to drum up some interest in the children’s book, and in the comic series. I haven’t been to a convention since last year’s New York show, so I am really excited to make that trip.


Dare I ask about that blog book you keep threatening to release?

ALEX: I don’t even want to talk about books, or getting books printed. Seriously. Ask Nathaniel.

NATHANIEL: Oh, sure. Ask Nathaniel. I think it's been long enough now that we can file this one under "Things We'd Like To See, But Probably Won't," along with the full story of The Great Comic Book Adventure of 2011 and Part 2 of that Transformers 101 guest post.

Oh, jeez. Didn't we promise you a t-shirt, too?

ALEX: And Exfanding Hand Puppet Theater©.

NATHANIEL: Yeah. You can officially stop listening to everything we promise you.

Open Letter to the American Public

Hey America,

We've got an election coming up, as you're surely aware. I mean, how could you not be aware? I barely follow politics, and I've become a veritable expert on the election just by skimming through what my friends are posting on Facebook. That's why I'm eminently qualified to share a little bit of sage advice with you: not because I know anything about politics, but because I see what you've been posting.

Let me give you a little background about myself first, though. I'm registered independent. I haven't been around long enough to have voted in too many Presidential elections, but so far I've voted for a candidate from a different party each time. The way I'm leaning right now, I see that trend continuing through this election, but I haven't done enough research yet to come to a final decision. Normally I try to abstain from politics until a day or two before the election, at which point I'll put aside an afternoon or evening to inform myself about who the various candidates are, what their stances are on "the issues," and the highlights and lowlights of the campaign trail. I typically look at a blend of moderate, liberal, conservative, and unbiased sources when doing my research, so as to get a broader and hopefully more objective picture of who's running.

I'll take some time to think over my ultimate decision, but even once I've decided who I'll vote for, I'll still listen to anybody who wants to persuade me otherwise. Once I was heading to the polls for a local election and was stopped by a campaigner for The Other Guy, who tried to change my mind at the last minute. I was pretty well set on my candidate, but instead of dismissing him outright, I let him pitch his candidate to me for a minute or two. After he concluded his spiel, I asked him, "So what is it about this guy that has you committed enough to stand outside in the cold, holding his sign for hours on end?" The man's reply, with a heartfelt grin: "He's my brother." Easy to forget that politicians are regular people with friends and families, and not the heroes and villains we so often make them out to be.

America, I've seen the way we talk about the candidates for this election. Of course we want to see our candidate win. Of course we like it when the opposition goofs up. We're a competitive nation with a news media that turns stuff like this into an entertainment spectacle; it's only natural for us to get swept away a little. Get excited; get defensive; get angry--you're betting the next four years on your horse, so you'd better be invested in this race. But when that investment turns into unbridled malice against anyone who doesn't agree with you or your candidate, you'd best step back and consider whether you've inadvertently bet your family and friendships, too. Shouting your opinions doesn't make you any more right; it makes you abrasive, and a poor recruiter for anyone who might otherwise listen to what you've got to say. We may be earnestly passionate at heart about the issues, but more and more we're coming across as irrational zealots who can't interact peaceably with people of varying viewpoints. We've broken politics down to a vicious "us versus them" mentality that completely overlooks the complexities of political issues and the humans who weigh in on them.

I can only speak for myself, but when I vote, I vote for the person who I believe is best for the country. What that means in this election might be completely different for the next one. I'm registered independent for the same reasons I don't always play a monk or a paladin in D&D: though they're fun classes that really click with my playing style, sometimes what the party really needs is a cleric or a ninja or a mystic theurge...and sometimes playing as a different class can give you a fresh perspective on the game.

We assume we have to pick either a Democrat or a Republican. We don't. We assume the country will fall apart if The Other Guy wins. Maybe it will. But we're not electing an all-powerful Dictator-for-Life who controls every aspect of our lives; we're voting to either replace or renew the biggest engine in our political machine, and the backup generator that goes with it. Whether the engine runs rough or smoothly, or breaks down altogether, there are so many other parts to this machine--and so many additional factors, both inside and outside the country--that nobody can guarantee how things are going to work. The best we can do is make an informed decision about the person we vote for, celebrate or commiserate once the results come in, and then stop complaining or rubbing it in people's faces.

You know what's more important than voting for the person who'll do the right thing for the country? You, yourself, doing the right thing for your country. So your candidate lost. Quit whining and use whatever skills and opportunities you have to still make their vision a reality. So your candidate won. Quit partying and use whatever skills and opportunities you have to ensure your candidate's vision is achievable and sustainable. So you've got no skills or opportunities to do much of anything. Be a decent human being; maybe you'll earn someone's respect and gain their ear when it's time to talk about the next Presidential election. And, failing that, you'll be a decent human being.

Politicians make great decisions and horrendous decisions. Sometimes we prosper because of them, and sometimes our lives are torn apart because of them. But that's really no different than the decisions we make for ourselves, and the decisions the people immediately around us make. No matter what happens during the rest of this election, and no matter what the next four years may bring, don't let the people get lost in the shuffle.

Stay cool, America.

Sincerely,

-Nathaniel Hoover

Regressive Progress and the Crisis of Communication

I've been observing two trends recently that are causing me to become more of a curmudgeonly hermit than I already am. The first trend is one that's been going on for years, but I feel has really snowballed in the last two or so: a shift to a culture driven--not aided--by technology. The second trend is one I've only started to feel in the past few months: a shift toward a culture of mass outrage and mass hysteria over any kind of news--good, bad, or otherwise--frequently spearheaded by informed citizens.

I had an idea for a short story the other day where a grandfather is explaining to his grandson why everyone from the older generation is so hunched over: they had all been enslaved, and their backs have become permanently bent from the positions their bodies had been in for decades. At the end of the story, the grand twist was to be that the grandfather hands the kid an ancient iPhone or BlackBerry, telling him something like, "This is what slavery looked like to us." We have become a culture not aided by our devices, but ruled by them.

It was, what, the 1950s or so when dishwashers and vacuum cleaners first arrived? I'm no historian, but everything I've read and seen about technology from the postwar years was that the United States, at least, enjoyed a few decades of increased domestic prosperity and happiness thanks to machines that made work easier, or did all the work for us. More time for leisure; less time wasted on chores. The American dream, some might say. A dream that, from my perspective, is twisting more and more into a nightmare.

I followed a link from Facebook recently to a news article about this grand invention that detects when the milk in your refrigerator is about to spoil, notifying you with a light-up display and via text message. Thank goodness for that; I've always found the expiration date on the bottle to be so hard to read. I realize we've had inventions like this for decades, but something about this one in particular caused me to pause and sigh at the state of technology in our world, or at least this country. We are creating devices that improve the quality of life by consuming more time and money than we can save without these devices.

Time and money are two things I have been especially aware of in the year and a half since I proposed to the woman who is now my wife. Weddings cost money. Planning takes time. Maintaining a home costs money. Working the job to support it takes time. Spending an evening or weekend with friends and a now-expanded family involves both time and money, whether it's gas money or snacks for your D&D session. Making YouTube videos and writing posts and articles is free, but the equipment costs money, as do the forms of entertainment that inspire the content, and the time investment to see a project through to completion can be considerable.

As the administrator of GameCola.net's official YouTube channel, and as a staff writer and editor for the main site, I feel it's my responsibility (and joy) to keep up with everything my comrades post. I've been finding time to catch up on a video playthrough of Phoenix Wright: Trials and Tribulations, and was stunned to discover that the last episode in a five-episode video series contains over eight hours of video footage.

In the time it takes me to watch that one episode, I could finish off an entire anime series. And when I start thinking that way about something that only takes a handful of hours, I begin to see entire months of my life disappear when I think about following through on my crazy plan to watch through the 35 years of Saturday Night Live that are available on Netflix. This is something I'm doing both for my own enjoyment and--as with any of the crazy plans I undertake anymore--so that I can share and discuss the experience with others...but it's staggering to think of how many 15-minute YouTube videos I could make in that same amount of time. (At the current rate of recording, about three.)

Even though the dilemma of what to do with my free time is shaped in no small part by the technology available to me, Netflix in particular simply makes it easier and cheaper to view the content I want than buying everything on DVD. In my mind, this is what technology is for: that 1950s vision of a more leisurely, more efficient way to live. Virtually everything I see around me today utilizes technology to make things different, and the increasing pace of technological developments--which require money to buy and time to learn--is driving a wedge between me and the rest of the tech-savvy world.

Where lifestyle-changing technology is involved, I don't do different. I do better. I'm more than content to stay on the sidelines while I observe the impact of new technology on the world before I consider jumping on the bandwagon. I did this with online shopping. I did this with texting. I did this with Blu-ray. I did this with Facebook.

I can no longer afford to be a few years behind everyone else and still expect to fit in with the culture of this generation. If I'm more than a few months behind, I'm archaic and out of touch. Things are changing too quickly, and I don't have the time, money, or interest to discover what's truly better until something is forced on me. Unsurprisingly, I'm discovering more and more that better is whatever I had before the forced change. I am a creature of habit, but more than that, I'm only seeing technological solutions to things that were never problems for me. Telephones shortened the distance between people in ways the postal service never could. E-mail opened up an additional means of communication that has many benefits over telephones. Now we've got technology that allows us to share everything we're looking at the press of a button, effectively eliminating the need to communicate at all.

That brings me to the second trend I've noticed: In a world where opinions are expressed with a Like button, we're veering away from meaningful discussions and unleashing our thoughts and feelings on polarizing issues in 140 characters or less. As my wife pointed out, everything good we post about is the best thing ever, and everything bad is the worst thing ever. Whether we're excitedly slapping up a link to this hilarious cat video or heralding the downfall of western civilization with whatever [pick one: Obama, Romney, Chick fil-A] did today, it's increasingly rare to see well-articulated opinions that take the extremist edge off of our concise gut reactions. We blow things out of proportion, or we present our completely rational and justified responses in such a inarticulate or reactionary way that we lose friends who would have at least tolerated us if we'd taken the time to explain ourselves over a cup of tea.

The trouble isn't just on an individual level, though: news travels fast through our social media-oriented culture, and our enthusiasm or outrage over something we post prompts someone else to retweet or repost the same content, adding their own enthusiasm or outrage. Repeat, ad nauseum. Now, instead of one person who's ecstatic or upset, everyone you know is ecstatic or upset. We are now statistics: X number of people think this way about animal testing, while X number of people think that way about it. There may be actual conversations that stem from the initial posts, but a quick skim through your feed tells you who you real friends are. In our solidarity, we have lost our individuality, along with our relative objectivity.

It has been unbearable to be around social media in the wake of the shooting in Aurora, Colorado that left 12 dead and 58 wounded. Unbearable to think about the loss of life, the suffering of the victims and their families, and how something so terrible could happen at all. Unbearable to think about it every hour of every day as new details emerge that encroach upon the personal privacy of the victims. Unbearable to have a flicker of concern about seeing The Dark Knight Rises on opening weekend because "midnight premiere of The Dark Knight Rises" was almost more prominent in the media's first news reports than the shooting itself. Unbearable because, from the perspective of someone who was not following the news and only seeing the headlines and snippets of coverage, the entire tragedy had spiraled into a nationwide Kickstarter campaign for actor Christian Bale to pay a visit to the victims in the hospital.

It seemed to me a surreal cause where the American people could demand the involvement of a celebrity whose only connection to the tragedy--as far as I knew from headlines and the one or two articles I'd read--was that he starred in the movie that was playing at the time. I know there's more to it than that. But my gut reaction to such a horrific event has given way to media fatigue and a sort of irrational indignation over how the whole country seems to be rallying behind a community that lost twelve people, while we remain silent on how, say, suicide is claiming almost eight times that many people a day in the U.S. Without understanding the full story, I'm just looking at the headlines and the numbers and the secondhand information, and forming opinions that make me sound like a bad person if you don't agree, and a worse person if you don't have the context of the rest of this post behind you.

So you can understand why I don't post things like this on Facebook. I couldn't even condense my feelings into a punchy blurb if I tried--but, as my wife points out, a punchy blurb is all we have to catch anyone's attention anymore. By the time you've written a thoughtful response, the Next Big Thing is here, and people have already forgotten what you're talking about. Yet writing brings clarity, and spilling my thoughts out on paper (or the electronic equivalent) allows me to sort through those gut reactions and come to a conclusion about why I feel as I do. Sometimes I need to say the wrong thing before I can get to the heart of why I said it. Sometimes I'm right, and "the wrong thing" is merely an unpopular, but valid, opinion. Sometimes I truly am wrong, which is why the door is always open for a civilized rebuttal.

My heart goes out to the victims in Aurora, and their friends and families. That there has been such a compassionate and supportive response speaks volumes about our culture. That I have mixed feelings about that response has me concerned. My willful ignorance of the full story, and my perception that social media and news media have inadvertently engineered such a massive response by skewing the story to keep Batman in the spotlight, make me worry that I'm becoming cynical in the face of something that clearly demands my sympathy. There's no question that we should care, but I worry that the media has needlessly emphasized the wrong information to draw out our genuine compassion for the right cause.

If someone on the sidelines can feel so conflicted about something so universally clear-cut, it's no wonder the people in the thick of debates about unclear issues such as politics and ethics can be so vitriolic toward those who disagree--they're probably all cynical, because people like me sound like idiots when they're firing off their gut reaction to an issue they're only partially informed about on their way to the hilarious cat video someone posted below you.

I think we'd all be happier if we started having real conversations again with each other, and started using modern technology the way it was meant to be used:

Waiting for Wednesday, Volume 4, Issue 54: Even More Amazing Adventures in Self Publishing!

[Continued from Part Seven.]

I'm starting to scare myself with the amount of time that I spend not sleeping these days (um, or nights, I suppose). I'm at a point where there just aren't enough hours in the day to get to everything I have going on.

For the first time in a long time, my creative energies are hitting on all cylinders, and I just can't bring myself to unplugging. Heck, I'm even finding time to blog again, which, if you'd have asked me a couple of weeks ago, I would have told you was not going to happen for a good, long while.

But here I am, up after midnight after a long day at the office, typing away and sending off countless emails to the artist on my next project. At the same time, I'm emailing and communicating with a number of people about my current project, the children's book I can't seem to shut up about.

I have no idea where any of this is going to take me. And, tonight (or, more accurately, this morning) as I start contemplating the cost of doing these things that I want to do, I have some butterflies in the stomach and a bit of worry, but it's a good, anxious, let's get this done already kind of worry.

I know full well that there's a pretty large possibility that none of the projects I'm currently hammering away on will make one single penny, and that the money I'm about to throw into them may not ever find its way back to me.

But I'm at a point where I can't afford to NOT do this. It's time to take that stupid risk that I have always been telling myself I'd take. It's time to suck it up and let the sacrifices of the past few years mean something. I've saved money and I've made decisions in my personal life that have always been rooted in getting my work out there, in the best-looking form humanly possible.

Nothing is cheap these days, especially within the publishing industry, so the money I'm about to spend is not going to be peanuts.

But I've been smart about saving it, and instead of using the money for other things that will assuredly help me down the road in life, I am going to use the money to try to get this dream off the ground. Because, frankly, I've had my feet planted for far too long.

Saying you're going to do something is nothing. Telling yourself you're going to do something is nothing. Convincing yourself that you're going to do something someday is nothing. It's all meaningless unless you actually go out and do it.

I'm at the point where "someday" is now. Right this moment. We're past the dreaming stage. We're past the let's-find-a-way-to-put-this-into-practice stage. We're miles beyond the, "Gee, I hope people will like this" stage.

We're at the Do It Now, or Do It Never stage.

Time to toughen up, Exfanders, because this is it. Right now is the moment the decision is made. This night (morning) is the one I look back on years from now and say one of two things about. And, even if this all amounts to absolutely zero, I promise you this: When I look back on this moment, I will not say, "I wish I'd just done it."

Because it's being done.

I have no idea what happens next. I have no idea if it's a financially stupid move on the part of a naive wanna-be writer.

The only thing I know is that, moving forward, there are no regrets.

Because I'm doing it.

I'm doing it.