MadMup.com

I am sooooooooooo late with this one, but it's finally up.

Here's the link, readers and fans.

Next up: Ground Control II for the PC and Virtual Skipper 3 for the PC.
0 comments

0 comments

It has been returned, and not a moment too soon. It was smelling up my van like rotten apples. Blech.

And the Wal-Mart lady said, "That's very nice of you. Thank you."

So there you go.
0 comments

Sorta.

I went to Wal-Mart last night to get some stuff I needed. (Milk, a surge protector, and some Pop Tarts, if you must know.) I've been to Wal-Mart four times in the last week, and it's the absolute worst time in the world to go there. All the Purdue University students are back in town, so the travelways and stores are generally packed. I'm adverse to crowds for the most part, so I've only been going because I really needed stuff.

So I buy my stuff and pick up the three bags (which the lady has tied closed for some reason - I mean, if I'm in Electronics and going to be walking through the store, I can understand tying the bags closed, but I'm right next to the exit. Bah.) and go home, via Target to maybe get a hot chocolate at the in-store Starbucks. Sadly, though Target was open, the in-store Starbucks was closed. Jerks.

So I get home, greet the cats - who always seem a little disappointed that it's only me coming into the house - and set my bags on the counter.

I open the first one: milk. Into the fridge!

I open the second one: surge protector, Pop Tarts, and new shirt. Counter, cupboard, clothes hamper.

I open the third one: soap and shoelaces. Huh?!? More importantly, Tropical Essence Dial soap. Not mine. I've grabbed someone else's bag.

Well, it was too late to take it back last night because I was tired of being out. I was going to take it back today after work, but I was beat. I could go right now, but I'd have to get dressed and it's raining. Bah.

So I'll have to do it tomorrow, I guess. By now, of course, the people who left it have gone back and gotten replacements and are wondering who took their stuff.

It was me, but I didn't mean to. I apologize unreservedly. 1 comments

About two years ago, the McDonald's nearest our mall here was torn down. in it's place they put up a McDonald's Diner. It was just like a regular McDonald's, but had extra stuff. For instance, you could go up to the counter and order food or you could sit down at a table and use one of the phones at each booth to call in your order. In a little while, someone would bring your food to you.

I always felt weird ordering my food from the in-store phone. "Phone" to me implies distance. When I know I'm talking to someone not very far from me, it weirds me out. Depending on where I was sitting, I could even see the person I was calling. It was just...weird.

The extra food was diner-ish food, as the name might imply. You could get open-faced turkey sandwiches with mashed potatoes, fried chicken, and even a steak! All in a decent amount of time, too.

When you were done, you took your receipt up to the counter and paid your bill, ever mindful of the "No Tipping" signs posted everywhere. It's in our nature as humans to want to tip people who bring us food, unless they go by the name of "Mom," for some reason.

Earlier this week, I stopped into the ol' Diner to get lunch (Filet o' Fish and a regular chocolate shake) and noticed something: it wasn't a Diner anymore. It was back to being a regular old McDonald's, albeit one with misshapen gaps in all the signs under the "McDonald's" where "Diner" used to be. All the booth phones were gone, too.

When I ordered my food, I said to the lady, "So, that whole Diner thing didn't work out for ya'll?"

She explained that the Diner was a six-month test that had turned into a two-year test. When I asked if they were going to open more Diners in the future, she said it was more likely they would just incorporate things they had learned into existing stores.

I immediately got a mental image of McDonald's as a person (let's call him "Mick"). I pictured Mick playing around with Legos and hamsters, trying different configurations until he found one that both he and the hamsters liked. I picture him (he looks an awful lot like Ronald McDonald, but with half-glasses perched on his nose) taking notes on his clipboard, observing carefully the eating habits and line flows of these hamsters as they belly up to the Lego counters. Every so often, Mick frowns deeply in thought. Occasionally he nods in surprise and acknowledgement as the hamsters do something he wasn't expecting, but on further review makes perfect sense.

Mick gets so intrigued with his project that he doesn't realize how quickly the time has gone by. When he finally looks up at the clock and realizes he's spent four times as long one his project as he meant to, he's a little embarrassed, but happy to have learned so much from his research.

As he removes his red and yellow lab coat and heads out the door towards home, there's a little spring in his step as he whistles the Big Mac song. He can't wait to use what he's learned!

We're all a little like Mick. We try things to see how they'll go. We don't have the luxury of testing our decisions on hamsters, though, so we have to try them out in real life. Sometimes they work out. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they work for a little while, but then stop. While we're doing all that, the other people in our lives are trying their own things. Sometimes the projects work well together and end up producing more and better results than either project would have produced on their own. Sometimes the projects completely cancel each other out, and sometimes they leave scorch marks where the projects used to be.

Since there's no lab for testing and no computer models for predicting, we pretty much have to use the results from one mini-project to make our decisions for the next big project. The thing is, as long as you're alive, there's always a next project. Sometimes we get so bummed about the dismal failure we've just been witness to that we start thinking it was the only project we were working on. Not so. There's always another project. Use your research! Apply the results! Learn and grow.

And the next time Mom brings you food, tip her. Don't use money, though. Be creative!
0 comments

You can read it here.

This one was interesting to me because a) it's my longest review thus far, and 2) I was pretty nervous to review a sports game. There's something about sports games that demands an in-depth review, as people tend to take their sports games pretty seriously.

It's also the highest-rated game I've done so far.
0 comments

I like to buy things for people. It's fun for me, and I like to see them enjoy something I've gotten for them.

It carries over to my cats, but it doesn't carry over very well. See, cats don't care. You can get them the coolest cat thing ever, and you'll never once get a "thank you" out of them. The best you can hope for is that they don't deposit a hairball in your direct path.

Not only are they not appreciative, but I feel like a complete fool walking through Wal-Mart with a cat thing under my arm. I might as well hold up a sign that says, "I dote on my cats too much and am a sad, strange person."

I think I've mentioned before that I bought them a floor-to-ceiling cat tree. While they will occasionally sit on the bottom two levels, they mostly use it as a perch from which to bite through the slats on the Venetian blinds. Ingrates. (A note: the only reason Nutmeg is on the top level in that picture is because I put her there.)

Today I got them a two-story, um, thing. I don't know what to call it - I guess the tag calls it a "kitty condo," but that's just too ridiculous. It's pretty much a two-story round thing, about two feet tall. They can't really fit inside the compartments in this thing, but they like to sit on top of it and sleep or look out the window. They took to it pretty well, after a lot of sniffing, so I guess that's good.

What was not good was me walking through the store with this thing while I'm getting some groceries. I doubt I could've looked like a bigger idiot. The cashier was nice enough not to call me names to my face, but I'm pretty sure I saw her write some down to share with her cashier buddies later.

So when it comes right down to it, I guess I'm not really buying the toys and towers for the cats. I'm buying them for me, in the hopes that the cats will do stuff on and to them that will amuse me. Next thing I need to buy "for" them is a video camera so I can force the world to be amused by my cats doing the exact same things that cats all over the country do.
0 comments

Yesterday I pulled up to a stoplight and looked over in the car on my left. I do this a lot, mostly because I am naturally quite nosy. I was right next to the rear of the car, so I could see the baby in the baby seat quite clearly. She was behind the driver's seat, and she was intently looking at her mother in the front passenger seat. Her father was driving, and her parents were quite involved in whatever they were discussing.

The look she had on her face was a little heartbreaking - if she were an adult, I would have classified it as a "Why is no one noticing me?" look. I'm about 95% certain that she had Down's Syndrome, so my heart just melted to see this look on her face.

After a little bit, she happened to look my way. I smiled at her (one of my really big smiles), and she kept looking at me. Soon, she started smiling back - first a little one, but then bigger and bigger as the seconds ticked by. I kept smiling to her and even waved a little at her. Oh, man, did she get happy.

Meanwhile, her parents were still talking in the front.

Sooner than I was ready for, they got a green arrow to turn, and I barely had time to wave to her once more before she was gone. From the moment I caught her eye until the moment I couldn't see her anymore, she never looked away. I'm convinced if we would have had 30 seconds longer, she would have been laughing.

I was sad to see her go, and I'm not really sure why. She couldn't have been any older than a year, and my guess is a little younger. As I wiped away a tear, I prayed a silent prayer that she would have a good life.

Goodbye, little girl. Thanks for bringing a smile to my face.
1 comments