Oh Bachelor, My Bachelor!
Yesterday was Chris' Bachelor Party. Now as any avid reader of my blog knows, my parents are getting separated. Yesterday mom was visiting my sister in Wisconsin, dad was in Naperville getting stuff for the condo, so I went to Chicago to gather belongings from the condo. Comics and some clothes _ I left a few clothes there just in case. I also stopped by Grahams to pick up my stuff. 2 t-shirts, but nothing else. They didn't have (or maybe it still hasn't been released) the new BPRD trade.
Then off to Long Beach, Indiana. I knew before hand that it was not to be traditional (strippers) but instead they planned to watch football, play Rock Band, and watch movies. I burned a copy of this week's 30 Rock (see last post) as possible viewing. He held it out in Indiana because it would be too far for people to go home and could get as drunk as they wanted. You can see the end of the story already, can't you?
I ended up taking 90 instead of 94. I meant to stay on 94 the whole way but there were detour signs (DETOUR SIGNS _ I TELL YOU!) and I ended up on the Indy Toll road. So I had to guess where I was supposed to go and for once, I guessed right. Normally even with really good directions I get lost but I exited at the best exit and would have made it there if I hadn't called but it was dark in the middle of Indiana and I had no idea if I guessed right at that time. So I called and they were able to confirm my guess. I arrived by 7:30 and the trip still only took the hour and an half from Chicago that I expected.
I arrived after the Green Bay game finished, but before the Patriots and we watched most of the Patriots game. They were playing Rock Band as I arrived. I predicted there would be no movie/tv watching and it would be all Rock Band apart from football because everyone in that group of friends LOVES Rock Band. But we even missed the first half of the 3rd quarter where I thought the Jaguars were still in it based on their first half performance. It is now part of history that they did poorly in that second half. So back to Rock Band.
If I had any free time (and a copy of the game and system) I would probably like Rock Band in the privacy of my home but in general I'm not a fan of playing video games in front of others. Mostly because they've played the game lots and are really good and if they think watching them play is boring (it seems most people think this), watching me is gonna be even more boring. I mean, I haven't even gone through the learning curve and basic operations are difficult. You then end up with people saying "press the x-button while holding the left trigger and moving forward!" Uh-huh. Rock Band has intsruments but you get the idea.
The second crappy part of playing Rock Band is it's a team game. You can cause your band to fail by not performing well. I don't care if we fail, but I do care if we fail because of me. It eats me up inside. Psychologically I take this pretty seriously and it's something I can't dismiss. It's one of the problems I have at work. So unless I'm really good at the game I hate playing cuz I hate being the weak link.
So going in I made up my Rock Band rules. I do my best to avoid playing but if I'm forced into playing, I play, try to do my best for the set of songs that I'm playing, and then I leave. Yes, I decided that if I play, that's the end of the evening for me. I am nothing if not petty. I ended up being forced into playing around 12:15 and played a 15 to 20 minute set: 4 to 5 songs. I did well until Metallica's Enter Sandman which, even on bass set to easy, was beyond my skill level and passed the bass off after the guitarist failed twice before anyone was able to have enough power built up to save him. When they finished Enter Sandman I went home. Got home around 2:30AM which included a stop for gas.
Yesterday was Chris' Bachelor Party. Now as any avid reader of my blog knows, my parents are getting separated. Yesterday mom was visiting my sister in Wisconsin, dad was in Naperville getting stuff for the condo, so I went to Chicago to gather belongings from the condo. Comics and some clothes _ I left a few clothes there just in case. I also stopped by Grahams to pick up my stuff. 2 t-shirts, but nothing else. They didn't have (or maybe it still hasn't been released) the new BPRD trade.
Then off to Long Beach, Indiana. I knew before hand that it was not to be traditional (strippers) but instead they planned to watch football, play Rock Band, and watch movies. I burned a copy of this week's 30 Rock (see last post) as possible viewing. He held it out in Indiana because it would be too far for people to go home and could get as drunk as they wanted. You can see the end of the story already, can't you?
I ended up taking 90 instead of 94. I meant to stay on 94 the whole way but there were detour signs (DETOUR SIGNS _ I TELL YOU!) and I ended up on the Indy Toll road. So I had to guess where I was supposed to go and for once, I guessed right. Normally even with really good directions I get lost but I exited at the best exit and would have made it there if I hadn't called but it was dark in the middle of Indiana and I had no idea if I guessed right at that time. So I called and they were able to confirm my guess. I arrived by 7:30 and the trip still only took the hour and an half from Chicago that I expected.
I arrived after the Green Bay game finished, but before the Patriots and we watched most of the Patriots game. They were playing Rock Band as I arrived. I predicted there would be no movie/tv watching and it would be all Rock Band apart from football because everyone in that group of friends LOVES Rock Band. But we even missed the first half of the 3rd quarter where I thought the Jaguars were still in it based on their first half performance. It is now part of history that they did poorly in that second half. So back to Rock Band.
If I had any free time (and a copy of the game and system) I would probably like Rock Band in the privacy of my home but in general I'm not a fan of playing video games in front of others. Mostly because they've played the game lots and are really good and if they think watching them play is boring (it seems most people think this), watching me is gonna be even more boring. I mean, I haven't even gone through the learning curve and basic operations are difficult. You then end up with people saying "press the x-button while holding the left trigger and moving forward!" Uh-huh. Rock Band has intsruments but you get the idea.
The second crappy part of playing Rock Band is it's a team game. You can cause your band to fail by not performing well. I don't care if we fail, but I do care if we fail because of me. It eats me up inside. Psychologically I take this pretty seriously and it's something I can't dismiss. It's one of the problems I have at work. So unless I'm really good at the game I hate playing cuz I hate being the weak link.
So going in I made up my Rock Band rules. I do my best to avoid playing but if I'm forced into playing, I play, try to do my best for the set of songs that I'm playing, and then I leave. Yes, I decided that if I play, that's the end of the evening for me. I am nothing if not petty. I ended up being forced into playing around 12:15 and played a 15 to 20 minute set: 4 to 5 songs. I did well until Metallica's Enter Sandman which, even on bass set to easy, was beyond my skill level and passed the bass off after the guitarist failed twice before anyone was able to have enough power built up to save him. When they finished Enter Sandman I went home. Got home around 2:30AM which included a stop for gas.