For those of you who have been following me from the beginning, (which is probably no one, but whatevs, :D ) I had originally started this blog to learn how to type. When I started this blog, I was still looking at the keys to type, and it was getting to be annoying, so I finally buckled down and taught myself how to do it.
I found this program, it is called Stamina. It is a free to download typing program, and was my main teacher through this process. It is pretty good. I have used Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing in the past, and I think that this is just as good. It pretty much follows the same process.
So anyway, here is the results from strictly not looking at my keys for probably about 7 or 8 months now. Still not better than most, but I think is still pretty impressive:
Now that summer has arrived, I have been spending a lot more of my time outside, and trying to be active. The video game season has pretty much slowed down over the past few months, with very few titles that have caught my attention. With the lack of free time that I have been having on a regular basis, I have become shallow, for lack of a better word, to what video games I will spend time with.
So, to get my video game fix, I usually only have a small amount of time at work. Once I finish my workload for the day, I will jump into a PC game for a while, since I cannot play a console game at work...otherwise I would love to play L.A. Noire.
A friend of mine had introduced me to a game that had been getting a lot of buzz. Apparently, it was made by a single man, and had sold something like 500,000 copies, and it was still in BETA. This game is called MineCraft.
When MineCraft was first explained to me, I was very intrigued. Basically, you just spawn in this randomly generated world. There is no tutorial, there is no instruction. You just are. You are alone in a very remote area, full of trees, islands, mountains, and forests. There is the occasional wild pig and chicken, but that is pretty much it. The trick is that everything is based off of a cube. Everything is cube shaped, and you can pick up the ground in cube shaped chunks, and place them somewhere else. This may seem pretty boring, but I was assured that it was amazing.
I had my doubts about the game. It didn't seem like there was enough depth to it. My buddy could tell that I was not amused, and he told me that it was like nothing that I was picturing. He was right.
The world of MineCraft
The game is literally all squared off. It makes for a very mysterious, artistic feel. Some people may be turned off from the graphics at first, but once you get into the game and realize the vastness of it, it will not bother you at all. As I said earlier, the main premise of the game is that you can pick up blocks, and put them in another place. This may seem to simple, but think about all the games we played as children, and the fond memories we have of them. Wasn't all Super Mario Brothers was making it from one side of the map to the other? Wasn't Tetris just about lining up blocks so there was no holes in between them? Wasn't Pong just bouncing a square off of a rectangle? Yes, MineCraft is just moving blocks, and that is why it is such a great game.
It is a simple building software. You can go and build whatever your mind can imagine. Players have built everything from replicas of the Roman Colosseum to the Star Trek Enterprise. It takes an amazing amount of time to build these things, but even if you are trying to build something on a much smaller scale, you can enjoy it just as much as all of the hardcore fans.
It is really hard to explain without literally showing you the game, so I suggest you check out this video and jump right in.
If you are interested, you can go to www.minecraft.net to try out an older version of the game for free, or you can buy the full version of the game, which I strongly recommend if you get sucked into the free version. There are so many little things that you do not get in the free version that makes minecraft an unforgettable experience that you will always go back to: Crafting Items, Farming, Hunting, Fighting Zombies, and a million other things. Below are some Images of the creations I made after countless ours of playtime with 2 other friends.
Moving on, I have been spending a lot of time outside for the past few weeks. The weather has been wonderful. I have always love to throw around a frisbee. I have come across a frisbee game that is amazingly fun. It is called Kan Jam.
Kan Jam is amazingly simple and Addictive
The thing that makes Kan Jam so great is the amount of excitement that can be built by throwing a frisbee into what essentially is a garbage can. You will be diving all over the place trying to get points.
You need four players to play Kan Jam, and there are two teams of two. The teams are set up like horseshoes, one at each end, and the first person to get to 21 points wins. As you get better, you can put the Cans even farther apart for more of a challenge. The game is great for BBQs and when you just wanna hang with your friends. It is also very amusing to watch as people dive and do whatever they can to try and get points.
You can find the game online, and in the stores. It usually runs for about 40 bucks.
As a kid, there was a lot of different things I loved to eat that I hadn't had in a long time. Fruity Pebbles was one of those things.
I could never resist the fruity, sugary goodness. I could eat an entire box every day for breakfast without getting sick of it. Then one day, a friend of mine told me that there was a beer that tasted just like fruity pebbles. I couldn't believe it, but he insisted. That beer is called Leinenkugel's Sunset Wheat.
It is an amazing beer, and it really does taste just like fruity pebbles! After you sip it, wait for it, after the beer clears your palette, 100% fruity pebbles. I have seen this beer in Shop Rite, and of course, any other beer distributor. I have even seen it on tap at Ruby Tuesday's a few times. It may not turn into one of your favorite beers, but it is a novelty that is worth picking up at least one sixer of it.
