In July Infinity Ward announced at E3 that they were having a beta for Call of Duty 4 on the Xbox 360 sometime in August. I was pumped for that after being a member of their site since day one. This past Wednesday they open up a lotto where you could send in an e-mail answering three questions and hope to get selected. While it wasn't a small choosing of people, it wasn't large. Days went by and I wasn't in, but finally today I got in. Checked my e-mail and their was my code and the congratulations from Infinity Ward. So I am glad to play it before the big rush of people come in on Monday once it becomes more available to the public of those who live in the U.S.

Tonight I played a little with Earthking and I must say the beta is amazing. There are three maps and each one is designed well and offers a great experience. The classes you can choose to be and the ranking system is cool too. I am normally a Heavy Gunner and have liked the weapons the class offers. Infinity Ward really has produced a game that will be great on the day it releases, this just from the beta. I haven't experienced much lag, so it has been good.

If you got in we need to play and start a Party Group. I love games that have a Party system built-in. The matchmaking has been excellent too.

Anyways, I start back up on school on Wednesday. So comes the end of my summer and here I go back to school to have loads of fun.:roll: I'll be glad to see my friends I didn't see in the summer, but by the third week I'll be wanting Christmas to come. Luckily Halo 3 comes out on September 25th! Less than a month now!:D

This week I get to go back to football to at least help out at practice. I am glad because I have been getting bored being at home since I had my tonsils removed. Then the following week I should get to practice again. I am excited for that to happen.

Anyways, Call of Duty 4 is something you need to sign-up for if you have a Xbox 360. Go to CharlieOscarDelta.com and on Monday those who live in the U.S. have a good chance to get. It'll be at 12:00 P.M. EST.

All of this entire MLB season has been looked upon for one thing, and that is the day that Barry Bonds would break the home run record that was now once held by Hank Aaron. 756 now stands the number and counting. That is quite a record and will take quite a person to break it. That one guy could now easily be Alex Rodriguez, who is the youngest players to hit 500 home runs.

I was glad that I saw it live because it is something I do want to remember. It's always better to see it live then in highlights. While it will always be heavily disputed that Barry Bonds may have used steroids, it is hard to take away from the guy right now. As of now, he is still considered "clean." I consider this records as one of the most famous through out sports. Again, while I believe this will be a hard record to break, it won't be impossible like that of Cal Ripken Jr.'s consecutive game streak. Barry has again said he will continue to play baseball. I am not sure how many more seasons, but it will be interesting to see where he ends up at. He is near 3,000 hits also.

On a non-related sports note, well kind of, I am having my tonsils removed this Friday. It is due to me be constantly sick with strep throat and lately they have been really swollen effecting my breathing and my speaking. So I will miss about a month of football, according to my doctor, which sucks. So I'll have little to do until I can go back and at least help out.

Hopefully everyone who celebrated the 4th of July yesterday had a good time. I know I did lighting off a lot of fireworks and just hanging out with my friends. It really was just a basic day, but the fireworks were still great.

Anyways, today I had my wisdom removed from my mouth. I had known that this was going to happen since last year. All four of them were removed during one surgery, which I remember nothing of. I can remember after and before, as well as one thing during the surgery I believe. They started off by putting a bunch of heart monitors on me. Then came the IV and finally the "laughing gas." It didn't make me entirely goofy when I was aware, but right before I went out I was tending to giggle just at random things. During the surgery I only remember the doctors saying that I had some irritation where the heart monitors were, but that I would be ok. I then waited in a room to wait for some of the effects to where off, so I was told, and then it was time for me to go home. I could barely walk to the car and was just really tired.

Once I got home I nearly passed out since I was so tired, but had to take some narcotics and some other painkillers as well as eat some pudding. Then I just crashed in my basement for a few hours. I have been up for a few hours now and feel pretty good. There is no real pain, just an annoyance feeling in my mouth. I did bleed a lot and it got all over my pillow when I slept since the gauze popped out of my mouth. I thought I'd be a lot worse, but as of now I appear to be fine and hopefully it doesn't get worse. I got Chipotle to eat now, since a burrito sounds great.

In other news, I sent out my Xbox 360 a little over 2 weeks ago and still have not received it back from the repair center. When I called the support line, there apparently had been a delay. Great service there. Once I get it back I am going to try and get into Rainbow Six Vegas as well as get NCAA Football 08 soon.

So I guess it is time for me to eat and stay bored until I can hang out with my friends. Good thing I am getting back in to Age of Empires III.

Later everyone.

It's finally that time of the year again.  Considerably my best moment that I know comes every year at around the same time.  That's right, school is out.  Today was our last day and was short due to it being an exam schedule.  Our exams started on Monday.  I had two and got out at 12:00.  Yesterday, I had two exams, but only had off in between the two.  Then today I got out at 12:00 and went out to eat with some of my friends.  It felt good to realize that I have quite a bit of time off and can do a lot, such as sleep in and stay up late, hang out with my friends more, play more video games and a lot of other stuff that I'll just do.

Along with the summer starting, so is football camp.  I'll have some periodically throughout the summer as well as start two-a-days in August.  Great.  Otherwise I'll just be lifting and conditioning from now until then.  Still, I am excited that football season will start, but not really until two-a-days are finished.:P  Those really are annoying and destroy my August.  Then school will start again.  I really shouldn't get ahead of myself hear.

In other news, I should be getting my license within the next two weeks.  If not, then I will have quite a few issues and be very mad because I need to get that damn thing soon!  I really wish I could have gotten it on my birthday in the middle of last month.  I could be doing anything I wanted with all the time I had and life would just be easier, for now.:P

In video game related things, I plan on buying Shadowrun.  That is when I can find it.  I have been calling a local store everyday and they never have it and the same goes with Circuit City.  These are the two closest place, but I am really surprised that Circuit City doesn't have it since mine is normally well stocked.  While Shadowrun did receive a lot of average reviews from the reviewers of sites and magazines, a majority of the community is saying that it is a pretty damn good game.  This considering you are a multiplayer kind of person, in which I am.  I have no real large issue with there being no true single player campaign, although it always makes a game a good amount better.  Whenever I can find Shadowrun I will buy it.  Hopefully this is really soon, like this weekend.

Let the summer roll in and be sure that I will make great use of all the time that I have off.  Hopefully you all are too, or will when you can.

Up until recently I didn't plan on getting till this Christmas.  Once my birthday came up two weeks ago, I had received enough money to get a Wii.  Now, I wasn't wanting one just because I had enough money, but because it was looking tempting after I noticed all the games out now and all the good ones coming soon.  I needed it before Christmas.

You would figure it would be easy to get one after 6 months of the Wii being out.  This is still not the case, just like the Xbox 360.  Yesterday I went to Best Buy to pick one up thinking it would be just there.  It wasn't.  Luckily the guy told me they were getting some in today in the morning when it opened and that they would get around 12-30 units.  Everyone knew about this so I figured I would have to come early.  I didn't really want to do that so I just came about 20 minutes early.  There was a huge line of about 60 people, although some were there as a group, and I was pretty damn sure it wasn't my day.  I stuck it out in the line and when I walked in Best Buy was still handing out tickets for the Wii!

Now that I am inside they have a special area reserved for the Wii.  Before you got your console there were lines of tables you had to walk buy with accessories and games.  Since I didn't have a ton of money to spend on accessories, thanks to me being able to drive soon, I just picked up the Classic Controller.  They didn't have any Wii Points so I will just buy those with a credit card.  Then came the time where I traded in the ticket so I could pick up my Wii!  It was a pretty exciting moment.  I didn't pick up any extra games, but that will happen within the next week or two.  Best Buy ended up getting about 50 units.

I am just so damn excited to have one and it will be great with my Xbox 360 and they shall rule my entertainment set-up.  So that proves that there is still quite a shortage of Wiis, at least in Columbus, Ohio, and I was pretty lucky to get one today without waiting in line for much.  Now it's time for me to set up my Wii and enjoy it!

Happy Memorial Day weekend everyone!

EDIT: I just got back from buying Super Paper Mario for $34.99!

It's already that time of year for me again.  Today, or rather early this morning, I turned 16 years old.  Some get excited, I really don't.  It's cool that it's my birthday, but it really isn't all that much more significant than any of my other birthdays.  The thing that I am excited about is getting my driver's license.  This will eb happening within the next upcoming weeks, probably early June.  I am all set for that with my car and all that stuff.  I will be driving a 98' Honda Accord.  So it was a pretty good day, besides being at school.  Once I get my license a new blog will come for sure or when I get  out of school, which ever comes first.

The Halo 3 beta was supposed to come out today but had been delayed till tomorrow due to some issues they have been having.  I tried some last contest attempts to get into it, but all failed.  I guess I'll just wait till it releases on September 25th.  That's a lot earlier than most expected.  I am wondering when Mass Effect will now come out and am hoping it isn't released in September.  If that is the case, I will have less time to play it so I am hoping for a release soon.  I am still wondering if any of my friends here got accepted into the Halo 3 beta or bought Crackdown and will play it through there.

My Xbox 360 had been working from time to time after I did the towel fix.  It was starting to become worse and rarely work, but all of a sudden it seems to have changed.  I have been able to turn it on the last few days without any problems which is good and bad.  It's good because it seems like a problem solved, but I still really should send it in because I doubt it will be good for the rest of its lifetime so I will probably still send it in. 

 

Wow, it has been awhile since I did my last blog and so much has happened since then, you could say.  I'll try to avoid sports since I am not willing to talk about that much of now, but have had a lot of gaming things going on.  That and the weather in Ohio has been great and I have been playing a lot of basketball with my friends.  Anyways, on to the good stuff.

For the past few months I have pondered over the decision of whether I should get a DS Lite or not.  The problem was how I was going to get the money.  I didn't want to just straight-up save $130 and spend it on one.  I was going to sell my PSP or find another way.  The problem was, I didn't feel like selling my PSP because I still liked it, somehow, and it is my main media player.  I wasn't and am not going to buy an iPod. 

A great opportunity raised this weekend and my friend was going to sell me his relatively new, hardly played, DS Lite for $60.  I was all over that deal and got the money and bought it from him yesterday.  I am very glad I did this since I can use my PSP mainly for media and my DS Lite for playing games on, especially on rides.  I did have a DS once but didn't like it so I sold it.  Then great games started coming out and I deeply regretted it, so having this opportunity was something that I only could have dreamed of occurring.

Over the next month or so, I plan to buy a few games for it.  Mainly games like The New Super Mario Bros, Mario Kart DS and a few other big titles.  Today I did buy a game for it and that was Pokemon Diamond.  Yeah, I kind of felt funny for buying it just based of off how silly it sometimes seems to me, but I always have liked the gameplay and it gives me something to do when needed.  I know I will and have already started building up an addiction for it.

So I am really glad I got a DS Lite and plan have set-up the WiFi for Pokemon Diamond.  The idea of implementing this was great and I already like it a lot.  The only problem with WiFi on the DS is the use of friend codes.  I just wish it could be similar to Xbox Live, which is very user-friendly.  This way you don't need a new code for every game and every works a lot more connected.  I do look forward to getting more games for my DS and am looking forward to the new Legend of Zelda game. 

Any other games people are willing to recommend to me would be great.

Aside from me purchasing a DS Lite, I have bought Guitar Hero II for the Xbox 360.  This game is truly outstanding and I am starting the hard tour.  The selection of songs is outstanding and having the online leaderboards adds a lot too.  The only problem I have with it, which is extra, is the cost of the downloadable content(songs).  It's around $6.25 for just 3 songs, but I don't really want to rant on that because I could go on for awhile.  Quite a few of my friends have GHII so I have been able to experience the multiplayer a few times and it is really fun, whether it be going head-to-head or playing a song together.

My Xbox 360 is pretty much dead again, just like in August of 2006.  I have been able to get it working for periods of days by using the "towel trick" which is basically where you suffocate your Xbox 360 and helps fix those messed up solder joints.  While it is weird how it works and probably wouldn't be recommended by Microsoft, I am still under warranty and will send it in for free once I receive the box from them.  It's pretty ridiculous how a system can be fixed and then break again, but who knows what they actually do.  Such a great system, but is just sometimes plagued by these hardware issues, from my experience.  Once it is fixed I will quickly forget while playing all the great games that are available and will be available. 

I am still hoping that Mass Effect is launched this month, or at least next month, so I can get it for my birthday or with money I get for my birthday.  My birthday happens to be in just 16 days(May 16th) and it will be my 16th birthday.(16, 16, 16?)  I will be able to get my license shortly after that within a week or so, I just have to finish up driver's-ed, which is the worst thing you'll ever take as you are killed with boredom. 

With all that said, school is slowly coming to an end.  In just about 37 more days, school will officially be over and on with summer.  Hanging out with my friends, video games, football, repeat.  I am just getting really excited about this summer and am just done with school now.  I still need to finish strong so I don't get myself into any trouble before the summer which would be painful.  Some of you probably end here in just a few weeks.

That's all I have for now.  Everyone stay good and have fun!

Let's start off with an image:

Now it may not mean much to any of you, or you might just think, "Ok, he is popping a tray."  Well this is a picture of my boy, Ron Lewis, pulling up with just a few seconds left against Xavier and draining a three to send it into overtime.  We ended up winning in overtime, but struggled to get there.

Let's backtrack a bit.  For most of this game, which took place on Saturday, it was a close game.  Then towards the end Xavier started to pull away and it really did seem like we had no shot at winning the game.  All of a sudden we started going on a good run and Ron Lewis was just raining down threes.  Xavier had just missed a free-throw and there was about 9.7 seconds left in the game.  We drive down the court, Ron Lewis comes off a screen and shoots a long three to send the battle of Ohio into overtime.  Now it puts a little more stress on us Buckeye fans, since one of our key players, Greg Oden, had fouled out.  To no surprise, Mike Conley Jr. steps up and keeps on scoring giving us the victory, 78-71.  This now sends us to the Sweet 16 to face today's winner, Tennessee.  Lewis finished out the game with a game-high, 27 points.  I am excited for the game this Wednesday. 

On a lower note, my bracket for college basketball, hasn't been doing so well.  The first day I was doing pretty good, but then have been doing bad ever since.  Now, all my Final Four teams are still in it, but I have lost to many games to really win the cash from my poll at school. 

Also, I just have 2 more weeks to go until I start my week long, Spring Break.  I can't wait to get all that time off and just do whatever.  Hopefully it will have warmed up more here, in Ohio, so I can do some stuff outside.  It was in the 70's here, for awhile, but has dropped back to the 40's.  I was lovin' the very warm weather after we have hard a rather harsh winter. 

Go Buckeyes!

 

Our user icons have been restored to basically the size they were before the redesign in 2005.  They are now 80x80, confirmed by your prefs, and look a lot better.  This has been something we have been begging for forever but just happened.  I am really glad because you can see other user's icons a whole lot better and can use a lot more.  It appears to be a bit glitchy, not much, but will be working well soon, I assume. 

Another thing that returns to us, is the link to get back to the forum you were just on, at the bottom of the page in a topic.  This isn't something huge, but is very convenient to have and seemed odd that it was removed once the redesign was done in 2005.

Another quick happy note for me and other Buckeye fans:

We are rolling along in the men's basketball league and are still a top number one, just after beating Wisconsin at home by one, in a very close and intense game.

Short blog there, but some good forum enhancements that were needed, and are nice to see back for those who were around when we had these.

After, I got home from the Super Bowl game last night, which my score was pretty close, it was a cold night.  Colder than it had been in years.  With the wind chill the temperature had dropped to about -20 degrees below 0.  There was a light covering of snow, but the cold is what nearly ripped your face off when you faced this ice cold weather.  Like most anyone else in school, I had some hopes for a "cold day".  Something that I have never been apart of before.  To add to that, my school district rarely even calls school off, or calls a delay, even when conditions are horrible.

I then got home to see if we got a delay or the day off, and nothing!:(  Then right before I was heading off to bed, I check one last time to find school was cancelled!  Yes, a "cold day"!  So I stayed up all night and just played video games with my friends.  Then today did the same thing since it was too cold to hang out or do anything else.  So it has already been a great day, but every school is closing for tomorrow, as the temperature is dropping.  I am hoping to see my school, but I don't.  BAM!  There it is!  Another "cold day"!  I am going to make use of tomorrow again, as well as pray for another one on Wednesday.  To make things better, I don't have school Friday due to a teach work day! 

What a great week this is turning out to be!  I am trying to live it up with myself and my friends!