Gamer Gilligan's Island

One of my good friends (and a friend of this blog as well) is Joe Huber: game designer, man about town, devoted husband, classy friend... and the guy who will introduced me to Entenrallye and Novo Dice. He asked the following (self-described) "weird question."

You're on a deserted island - and failed to pack your top 10 games (or any games, for that matter). Given the materials available on the island (think Gilligan's Island, material-wise), what games do you cobble together to pass the time? Or do you instead focus on designing your own games, to best take advantage of the materials?

Now, here's the deal... I want to be cool and maker-friendly and all that and say something like, "I think the natural elements could inspire me to create a game that is both organic to the island and profoundly playable." In reality, I'm gonna be trying to figure out how to make dice out of dried coconut and playing cards out of palm leaves.

Follow-up: you're on a desserted island. Which do you try first? And which desserts do you think would make the best materials for cobbling together games?

Cookies, please.

I think you could do some interesting things game-wise with fondant and hard candies... but it would likely be a Legacy game where the pieces got destroyed.

Yet Another Reason to Go To Germany... Besides the Games

A complete time-waster... but an awesome use of Google Maps. You can explore Minatur Wunderland to your heart's content with 360-view pictures.

Click HERE to see the Google Map amazing-ness.

Dang, I want to go see this in person. 

Friends '88 in 2013

This video is two years old... today. It was filmed as we drove eastward across the mountains into the Mojave Desert.

Enjoy!

Classic: Invasion of the Peep Army

A few years back, my friend Jimbo was "inspired" by a message I preached (using Peep Science as a metaphor for eternal security - see PeepResearch.org for the original inspiration) and went out the week after Easter & bought 300 or so Peeps of various colors & types... and snuck into my office and, well, Peeped it out. Every flat surface in the place had a Peep on it.

In 2010, he outdid himself with the Invasion of the Peep Army.

The first Peep appeared on Saturday next to my bathroom sink. "Mark - We've missed you." His title was "Scout Peep" and he was an indication of things to come.



On Sunday morning while I was getting my sermon ready, Sandra delivered the second Peep to my office after I appropriated a doughnut from the adult Sunday School stash. "A good Peep is never afraid to eat with the enemy." This one claimed to be a "Secret Agent Peep."



Then, right before the worship service, I went to get my wireless microphone and found yet another advance Peep - the "Audio Surveillance Peep." The ominous message: "We are listening."



We went to the Archuleta's for Easter lunch (we're the special guest gringos to make the gringo son-in-law, T, feel less lonely!) :-) and when we returned, we spotted the first signs of the Peep invasion on our gate. Yes, that's Peeps rappelling into our backyard.



On closer examination, I found that these were "Special Forces Peeps." I wonder where they go to get their intensive training. (Maybe this explains why they're so difficult to find in the store 10 months out of the year.)



Once in the backyard, there were Peeps with parachutes hanging from a variety of places. Evidently, "Paratrooper Peeps" are not good at reaching the ground.



One Peep-a-Trooper even managed to get hung on the old garage light.



At first glance, I wasn't sure who this troop was advancing through the high grass of our side lawn.



Turns out, it was "Infantry Peeps."



There were also "Calvary Peeps" - with Peep bunnies riding Peep chicks. Their objective seemed to be the patio.



The Peeps came prepared to take losses, complete with Peep coffins & a chaplain. "Some casualties for you to enjoy." (I suspect the "dead Peeps" are actually some sort of Trojan Horse kind of trick.)



Finally, knowing the futility of attacking something many times their size (even with their imposing numbers & near-indestructibility), the Peeps positioned "Sniper Peeps" throughout the yard - on the fence, in one of the trees, on the boys' basketball goal...



...and the final holdout near the eave of the old garage.



Menacing little bugger, isn't he? (I knocked him down with a stick.)



Of course, that was so the Peep Elimination Squad (my two sons) could harvest the Peep Army for some planned experiments involving Peeps & a microwave. (See Peep Science for more ideas on how to experiment/"torture" Peeps for educational purposes.)



Or perhaps as a tasty snack.

Keep Your Godless Commie Pinko Hands Off of My Candy! (2013 Edition)

Some years ago, I wrote about a disturbing trend in candy packaging...

Last night, perusing the candy selection at our local Walgreens, I noticed that the new King Size Chunky wrapper has the words "Great to Share" emblazoned on it. Now, I've put up with the whole "Tear'n'Share" nonsense from M&M's for quite a while now, but I can no longer sit idly by and watch this insidious brainwashing spread. 

If I wanted you to have some candy, I'd have bought you your own. Keep your hands off my chocolate!

So imagine my consternation when my boys & I visited our local Target store & found this!

Is there no end to this diabolical plot to force socialistic practices on unsuspecting sugar addicts?

In related news, we also discovered a 22 ounce gummi bear...

and 2 half pound Reese's Peanut Butter Cups...

 

 - all without any insistence on slicing & sharing with my comrades. (Though I do have a scary mental picture of me gnawing on the giant gummi bear like a dog.)

 

 

Halloween Blogging

Some thoughts on Halloween from three (well, at least two) interesting sources:

Church Marketing Sucks - Trick or Treat: What Message Does Your Church Send on Halloween?

Consider the church that’s leery of zombies. Instead of a Halloween party, they have a harvest party with costumes and candy and smiling jack-o-lanterns. But it’s not Halloween—no sir! That’d be evil.

These churches are only fooling themselves. Everybody else knows it’s a Halloween party. You can’t decry something as evil but then co-opt it for your own message. That’d be like Mark Driscoll launching a yoga ministry. Instead you need to be sneakier and take over a pagan holiday, but that’s another story.

Stuff Christians Like - Feeling Bad You Didn't Blog About Halloween

Good n’ Plenty. (Worst candy ever. It’s like the reverse of candy. It’s candy punishment.)

Mark Jackson (yep, me... w/my pastor hat on!) - Costumes

I'm guessing I was 11 or 12 years old when I decided to put on my heaviest winter coat, a pair of swimming goggle with large individual eye pieces, a knit cap & my for-real camping/hiking backpack (stuffed with newspaper)... to be a climber. It actually was a pretty good looking costume, if I don't say so myself.

The only problem is where I was wearing these layers of heat-trapping stuff - in southern California on a particularly warm Halloween night. It was like being trapped in a sweat factory of my own making.

Follow the links to read all that we (yes, we) had to say.

Stuff Christians Like #867: Desiring Chick-fil-A more on Sunday than any other day of the week.

Thank you, Jon Acuff...

Could you buy some Chikc-fil-A on a Saturday and then eat it on a Sunday? Would that work or would that be like when the Israelites tried to gather up double portions of manna? Didn’t that work for them on Sunday? Are you really comparing Chick-fil-A to manna? Yes, yes you are and that feels about right.

Read the whole post on Jon's blog, Stuff Christians Like.

Funny Conversations With Sales Clerks

Scott Roberts started a thread about clueless salespeople over on Boardgamegeek... I just wanted to share some highlights (or lowlights, depending on how you look at it) with you. (After a while, they also started adding clueless customer stories.)

Boardgames

• Scott: Do you have the boardgame Risk: Halo Edition?
• Worker: What is that?
• Scott: It is a boardgame.
• Worker: Boardgame? Is that a shirt?
• Scott: No. Do you know what boardgames are?
• Worker: No.
• Scott: As in toys and games. Do you know what games are?
• Worker: Yes.
• Scott: It is like Monopoly. Monopoly is a boardgame.
• Worker: Oh, Monopoloy. I think we had some of those. Let me go check.
• Scott: No, I am not looking for Monopoly. I am looking for a game called Risk: Halo Edition.
• Worker: (sounding uncertain) Ok, let me go check.
• [leaves and comes back]
• Worker: I am sorry, sir, we are out of Monopoly.

Vegetables

• "How many corn do you have there?"
• "A dozen."
• * blank stare *
• "A dozen."
• * blank stare *
• "Twelve...."
• "Thank you."

DMV

Several years ago, I moved from my native Canada to New Jersey. One day I went to the DMV to get a driver's licence. The rule was you had to relinquish your out-of-state licence, UNLESS it was from a different country; then you could keep it.

I passed the test and filled out the paperwork and the clerk handed me my new licence. There followed this exchange:

• Me: Can I have my old licence back, please.
• Clerk: Oh, you don't get that back.
• Me: I think I do because it's from a different country.
• Clerk: What?
• Me: It's a Canadian driver's licence. I get to keep it.
• Clerk: Canada's not a different country.
• Me: Um...yes, it is.
• Clerk: No, it's not.
• Me: Yes. It is.
• Clerk: No, it's not.
• Me: Canada is a different country!
• Clerk: Well, maybe, but it's not really a different country. It's not like India.
• Me: Yes! Yes! It's exactly like India! It's a different country!

She eventually, reluctantly gave me my old licence back, but I could tell she didn't believe me.

Books

• Customer: Can you help me find a book?
• Staff: Sure. What are you looking for?
• Customer: Well I think it was yellow.
• Staff: You mean the title was "Yellow"?
• Customer: No, the cover was yellow. Or it might have been orange. Do you have that book?

Fast Food

McDonald's used to sell Bagel Breakfast sandwiches. They had Bacon, Egg and Cheese Bagels and Ham, Egg and Cheese Bagels.

At some point they discontinued the Ham, Egg and Cheese Bagels, but that's the one I liked. Here's my drive through conversation every time I ordered breakfast there until they discontinued bagels altogether:

• Me: I'd like a Ham, Egg and Cheese Bagel, please.
• Clerk: I'm sorry we discontinued the Ham, Egg and Cheese Bagel.
• Me: OK, can I get a Bacon, Egg and Cheese Bagel?
• Clerk: Yes.
• Me: Can you remove the Bacon?
• Clerk: Sure.
• Me: And can I add Ham to that?
• Clerk: You got it.
• Me: Thank you.

A final word from aka pastor guy...

As a former employee of a Christian bookstore who was tasked by one customer to find a "Baptist Bible" for her (there isn't one, btw) and who had a customer cuss us out for selling her the wrong Bible (evidently she didn't read it), I am sure this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The Invasion of the Peep Army

A few years back, my friend Jimbo was "inspired" by a message I preached (using Peep Science as a metaphor for eternal security - see PeepResearch.org for the original inspiration) and went out the week after Easter & bought 300 or so Peeps of various colors & types... and snuck into my office and, well, Peeped it out. Every flat surface in the place had a Peep on it.

This year, he outdid himself with the Invasion of the Peep Army.

The first Peep appeared yesterday next to my bathroom sink. "Mark - We've missed you." His title was "Scout Peep" and he was an indication of things to come.

This morning while I was getting my sermon ready, Sandra delivered the second Peep to my office after I appropriated a doughnut from the adult Sunday School stash. "A good Peep is never afraid to eat with the enemy." This one claimed to be a "Secret Agent Peep."

Then, right before the worship service, I went to get my wireless microphone and found yet another advance Peep - the "Audio Surveillance Peep." The ominous message: "We are listening."

We went to the Archuleta's for Easter lunch (we're the special guest gringos to make the gringo son-in-law, T, feel less lonely!) :-) and when we returned, we spotted the first signs of the Peep invasion on our gate. Yes, that's Peeps rappelling into our backyard.

On closer examination, I found that these were "Special Forces Peeps." I wonder where they go to get their intensive training. (Maybe this explains why they're so difficult to find in the store 10 months out of the year.)

Once in the backyard, there were Peeps with parachutes hanging from a variety of places. Evidently, "Paratrooper Peeps" are not good at reaching the ground.

One Peep-a-Trooper even managed to get hung on the old garage light.

At first glance, I wasn't sure who this troop was advancing through the high grass of our side lawn.

Turns out, it was "Infantry Peeps."

There were also "Calvary Peeps" - with Peep bunnies riding Peep chicks. Their objective seemed to be the patio.

The Peeps came prepared to take losses, complete with Peep coffins & a chaplain. "Some casualties for you to enjoy." (I suspect the "dead Peeps" are actually some sort of Trojan Horse kind of trick.)

Finally, knowing the futility of attacking something many times their size (even with their imposing numbers & near-indestructibility), the Peeps positioned "Sniper Peeps" throughout the yard - on the fence, in one of the trees, on the boys' basketball goal...

...and the final holdout near the eave of the old garage.

Menacing little bugger, isn't he? (I knocked him down with a stick.)

Of course, that was so the Peep Elimination Squad (my two sons) could harvest the Peep Army for some planned experiments involving Peeps & a microwave. (See Peep Science for more ideas on how to experiment/"torture" Peeps for educational purposes.)

Or perhaps as a tasty snack.

Odd Bits Of Video

Set the Wayback Machine for 2003... when, after the closing of the church @ hickory hollow and before I came to be senior pastor here at NewLife Community Church, I worked for a fulfillment house. Our main customers were Tae-Bo & Gaither Homecoming - meaning I worked most of the time on an assembly line of sorts, inserting advertisements into video cassettes and/or stacking & boxing them. About 6 weeks into my employment there, we took over fulfillment for Hot Licks Instructional Videos - which are primarily rock & jazz guitar videos.

Part of the process of sorting out the horrendous mess that was Hot Licks (the previous folks doing fulfillment sold us their entire stock & basically dumped it into pallet sized crates) was having new videos made from the masters... and that's when I discovered Tuck Andress' amazing rendition of Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror."

It occurred to me this morning that this might be on You Tube... even though I haven't heard/seen it for nearly 7 years. And it was. Enjoy.

You Tube has other fun things, of course, like this... for example, one of the games coming in my Amazon.de order (German Amazon.com, btw) was previewed on this video from the Nürnberg Neuheiten early in 2009. Those are mirrors! (The name of the game is Burg der 1000 Spiegel - "Castle of 1000 Mirrors.")

And, because you never can have enough obscure Canadian CCM bands mentioned in a blog post, I give you the boys of Hokus Pick. (Man, we loved these guys... some of the best live shows I've had the privilege of attending. Check out their MySpace Music page as well...)

Lego Toy Story 3!

7596 Trash Compactor Escape Originally uploaded by fbtb

Man, my wallet is in SO much trouble next fall.

For more info, check out this page on From Bricks to Bothans.

Queen: A Night At The Television Set

Thanks to Chris Lohroff for pointing this out. It's an act of sheer genius, on par with this...

Visual Learners

At some point in my education (probably seminary), I was given WAY too much information about learning styles. Some of us are "reading-writing preference learners" (that would be me, btw); other are "tactile" or "kinesthetic learners" (that would be my wife.) A few are "auditory learners" (probably no one in my congregation, he sez grinning) and finally there are the "visual learners." (With this paragraph, I'm reminded of Craig Ferguson's wee "Scottish finger rabbits" - if anyone can give us a link to the clip, I'd love to find it.)

For the visual learners in the audience, here are a couple of websites I've happened upon recently.

Cake Wrecks came up thanks to a conversation at a party on Saturday night (Happy Birthday once again, Lydia - 30 is the new 29!) which started being about spell-checking emails, then morphed into the TV shows ACE OF CAKES and CAKE BOSS... and finally led us to this completely gonzo website/blog. Be warned, some of the humor is a adult-edged... but the just plain WRONG things that are done in the name of cake decorating are absolutely hysterical.

A good place to start is Cupcake Cakes: Always Wrecktastic. Always. From there, you can move on to the right-hand sidebar menu, which contains a list of fan favorites & "classic" posts, including the pictured Naked Mohawk-Baby Carrot Jockeys, I Want Sprinkles, and The First Censored Cake Wreck. The last of these is wrong on SO many levels that it must be seen to be believed.

I heard about My Parents Were Awesome on NPR a few weeks ago... and instead of being a fount of laughter (for that, go directly to Cake Wrecks; do not pass Go; do not collect $200), it's a sweet trip down memory lane. I find myself looking at the pictures and wondering about the stories behind them.

Basically, the creator of the website just has folks sending pictures (and stories) about their parents when they were young. As he says, "Before the fanny packs and Andrea Bocelli concerts, your parents (and grandparents) were once free-wheeling, fashion-forward, and super awesome." It's nifty stuff.

Abston Church of Christ

I got forwarded some pictures of this epic Lego building, but with no link (and, sadly, some of the usual "forward this if you love Jesus" hoo-ha that makes me irritable and keeps me from forwarding it out of sheer spite for trivializing the message of Christ with such crapola... even though I do love Jesus.)

Anyway, I thought I'd share a picture here (look carefully - it's made COMPLETELY of Legos) and link you back to the Abston Church of Christ - a work of love by Amy Hughes. If you like monster Lego projects and/or cats, go check the site out.

Did anyone else notice that there are no "back-row Baptists" at this church? In fact, there are a lot of people down front! Evidently I've pastored the wrong churches - the front row has always been kind of a moat between the pastor & the congregation.

Rolling Through The Bay

Go watch this video clip... seriously. It's guys like this that make me feel better about my collection of nearly 1000 board games - I mean, 35 years to build a toothpick sculpture of San Francisco? I look positively normal next to him!

Chain of Fools

I don't care if it's "for our soldiers" or "to show everyone how much I love Jesus" or even "because this will save the lives of kids from hypodermic needles hidden in the play areas of various fast food establishment ball pits"... I am not forwarding your stupid e-mail. Don't threaten me, cajole me or attempt to motivate me with guilt, it's not going to happen.

Yosemite Bound

So, this is what Shari is afraid of... our food getting bear-jacked. (Her fears, btw, are not irrational... take a look at this no-audio video from the National Park Service.)

The bear in this picture, btw, has chosen to try & break into a Hummer in the Curry Village parking lot. Evidently he's auditioning for the Yosemite Valley edition of "Cops."

OTOH, this is what I'm looking forward to...

My Brute

As if any of us need another time-waster... but here it is: My Brute. (Be warned: clicking on this link makes you my pupil and I will school you with my awesome stick & net fu!)

Thankfully, it's one of those "5 minutes a day" time sinks rather than something like, well, Facebook or a blog.

Brother, Can You Spare A Definition?

I really, really, really don't like it when I don't know the answer to a question. I was one of those kids who loved to raise my hand in class & answer - not quite Horschak-like, but dangerously close to Lisa Simpson territory. (I also had the same scintillating social life as these two fictional characters - whoopee.)

So, when Shari asked me Saturday night what the difference was between a recession and a depression, I was kind of stunned when I realized that the only honest answer I had was, "I know they're different & that recession is better than depression, but otherwise I don't know. We'll have to look it up."

And, to the best of my limited abilities to operate Google & other web information sources, here's an answer. OK, some answers... but they don't necessarily agree with each other.

1. Economists don't all agree on the exact definition of a recession. (reference: About.com) This, of course, would scare me if I didn't the exact same behavior with theologians (predestination & freewill) and board gamers (open & closed holdings).
2. The standard "newspaper" definition of a recession is 2+ quarters (6 months) where the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) declines. (BTW, the GDP is the total value of all final goods & services produced in a particular economy." (reference: Wikipedia))
3. Dave Ramsey has recently said that "the official definition of an economic recession is an economy that has negative growth, that shrinks, for six consecutive months or more." (reference: CBS News)
4. A depression is when that decline is 10% or more... meaning the last depression we had in the U.S. was in the 1930's.

Now, depending on what numbers you look at, we are either in a recession (majority opinion) or not (Dave Ramsey & some other naysayers) but not in a depression. (We may, however, be depressed about our financial situation - that's a different issue.) I'll just let Dave speak for himself:

"The U.S has the most robust economy in the history of man, and it's the most sophisticated it's ever been; there are lots of checks and balances and safety nets," Ramsey explained.

He pointed out that, "The market dropped the same amount (relatively) when President Nixon resigned as it did during the Great Depression, but there were so many more safety nets in place in the 1970s that the drop didn't have the same effect. The markets dropped 511 points in minutes when the markets opened after 9/11, but there still was no crash or meltdown.

"By definition we are not in a recession," Ramsey said forcefully. "We have not even had one month of recession; we've had SLOW GROWTH. The economy was growing at (an annual rate of) 3.5 percent; now, it's at 1.5 percent, which is a big impact, but it's still growth."

I'm a big fan of Dave Ramsey - but listening to the back'n'forth between the "now is the perfect time... to panic!" crowd and the "there's a pony buried under here somewhere" crowd, I'm reminded of two stories:

1. Ye Olde Parable about the blind men & the elephant
2. The wisdom of Homer Simpson: “Oh, people can come up with statistics to prove anything. 14% of people know that.”

I'm also reminded of one of my favorite passages from the Bible:

Though the fig tree does not bud

and there is no fruit on the vines,

though the olive crop fails

and the fields produce no food,

though there are no sheep in the pen

and no cattle in the stalls,

yet I will triumph in the LORD;

I will rejoice in the God of my salvation!

Yahweh my Lord is my strength;

He makes my feet like those of a deer

and enables me to walk on mountain heights!

(Habakkuk 3:17-19, HCSB)