A Slice of Fried Gold
Showing posts with label Foosball. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Foosball. Show all posts

The Weekend Edition

Monday, April 28, 2008

To wrap up my ode to Alaska that has taken place over the past few posts...thanks Alaska. Thanks a lot. I'm not going to say you ruined my weekend, but I am going to say you significantly altered my weekend. It was still a good weekend, but one that was hampered greatly by 17 inches of snow being dumped upon the greater Anchorage area and quickly followed by the rapid melting of said 17 inches.

For those wondering what exactly that is like, it is not good. It makes driving interesting and even though I get bored bored while driving, I'm definitely not looking for this kind of excitement. However, I'm not one to let Mother Nature bring my chi down, regardless of how evil she is being. Oh no, no I am not. Here's your weekend edition.
  • Deciding on a Foosball Table (for the most part)
  • Getting my camera (Booyah! See above post)
  • Finally catching Lost (explosions, and Benjamin Linus, and smoke monsters! oh my!)
  • Going out to Koots with Amy, Chris Sharpe, and Nick
  • Dancing like an idiot and getting owned at Foosball
  • Harold and Kumar go to Guantanamo Bay
  • Bad Movie Night
  • Snow City with Brian
  • Bstar ruling...ho hum
  • Finishing Season One of How I Met Your Mother (more on this later)
  • Suite 100 with my parents
  • Rocking out with Amy
So it was a good weekend, but one that was forced to take place almost entirely inside when it was originally planned to feature the Heart Run and a hike at a nearby mountain. Oh yeah, and it was also planned to have nice weather. Thanks for ruining plans Alaska!

Anyways, what am I going to elaborate on this week?


Well, this weekend's highlight had to be the bad movie night. Although less good than previous successes (but really, what night can top two times ago - Sleepaway Camp AND Surf School? Nothing. That is the only answer) it was still a fairly successful one. Really, the keys to any bad movie night are fairly simple:
  • Good mix of people
  • Alcohol (or sugar/caffeine if underage)
  • Movies must try to be good - cannot try to be bad
  • Must include one Uwe Boll movie
  • Must mix genres (although horror movies from the 80's are seemingly always good picks)
We had a strong mix, with Colver, Lorna, Amy, Brian, and myself being involved (stalwart Kim is off in the Carribbean having the time of her life - damn her!), plenty of drinks, we had Dungeon Siege to cover our Uwe Boll base (you haven't seen someone phone it in until you've seen Ray Liotta phone it in), and we had a fine mix of genres that all thought they were great (Dungeon Siege, Ski School 2, Bounty Huntress, and I Know Who Killed Me). On top of that, we had the unnecessary but wholly welcome addition of a Manhattan Pizza (amazing pizza).

It was a great time, however we made two huge mistakes - we started with Dungeon Siege which was over two hours long (total rookie mistake) and we Lorna somehow managed to pick a Skinemax movie for the third consecutive bad movie night (we knew it, but we thought we could make it work...again). They definitely brought the night down a bit, but we made it work great anyways. It was a great time like always, and any night I get to spend with my great friends is always one well worth spending. Especially when we're impersonating episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000, which is always great.

Tuesday is the best day of the week [Reprise]

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

As some of you may remember, way back in the day on my blog (see post here) I had claimed that Wednesday was the best day of the week. It had it all! New comics! Lost! Trivia Night! How could that be beat? Well, a number of things happened to bring down the quality a little bit. First off, Hooters closed which effectively killed trivia night. Second off, Lost moved to Thursday. Finally, it is still the standard comic day, but one in every five Wednesday's don't even bring my sweet, sweet comics into my grasp (like today).

So even though it is still very lustrous as comic days have only gotten better (seriously, combine becoming friends with Will and Jared from my comic shop with the major events that are happening right now - Secret Invasion AND Final Crisis - well, let's just say my visits are satisfiying) and Colver and I have picked up Wednesday as our official day to go play basketball and show off our mad hops and elite dunking skills. So it's still a great day.

However, last night Tuesday launched it's first salvo in what may become a very ferocious war for "best day of the week" (clearly weekends are exempted - they're weekends! they are obviously the best), as three fantastic events went down for the first time, with one being a weekly repeat for sure and the other two potentially standing up as weekly or bi-weekly events. What were they?

  • Trivia Night v 2.0
  • Foosball at Koots
  • Rock Band at Koots
As we discovered last night, the Drunken Cowboys (back from the dead!) may have found a new home at one of the least likely of places - Eddie's Sports Bar. Arguably a bit of dive, Eddie's essentially has become the spiritual descendant of Hooters, except it may in fact be somewhat less classy (as unbelievable as that sounds). However, it does have a few things going for it.

  • Fast paced
  • Reasonable questions
  • FREE!
  • Cheap Taco Bar!
  • Shuffleboard, Darts, and Pool
  • Decent service
Of course, it misses a little somethin' somethin' that Hooters had going on, it was still really fun and very packed. Strangely enough, considering Humpy's is a far "cooler" bar, it seemingly is by far the worst of the three trivia nights. I personally can't wait for next week, as we almost won and the money is carrying over to next week ($400!! Bling bling!).

In addition, they have two man team Sports trivia on Thursday's, which Colver and I will start attending next week. This is where I will likely unleash my fury, as I have a rather encyclopedic knowledge of all things sports. Besides gymnastics. I know nothing about gymnastics.

After this, we were nearing the revelation of Rock Band supergroup Bitchface (as we've so colorfully named ourselves) starring the one time Hey Hermano and current Puma Town singer, guitarist, and drummer...aka Amy, myself, and Jason, and the shredding champion of Eagle River band Five Star Whammy...aka Jon. We went a while early to hang out and have a couple drinks (don't worry kids, I know it was a school night plus I had a blood test the next day - all water for me, so the night was cheap!) and play some Foosball.

As some may know, I've always despised Foosball. I generally don't like doing things I'm bad at, and I was terrible at Foosball. However, since getting involved with the crew, their overwhelming passion for the sport has rubbed off on me a bit, and after playing A LOT I've become not bad at the game. At times good, but I make a ton of dumb mistakes still. Regardless, the teams were Jason and myself (fresh off of a 4-0 evening at the Homestead Lounge two weekends previous) and the shooting stars that are Amy and Jon. Now if I was going to do a ranking on skills of us four, it'd likely go as follows.
  1. Amy
  2. Jon
  3. Jason
  4. Me
However, in true sporting fashion the most talent does not always win. No sir it does not. This time, the best team won. That team? The Slo Mo Rollers, starring Jason and myself. We took five of six games from the absolutely shocked Amy and Jon, as they simply could not handle Jason's staunch defense, my magical dribbling up front, and our perplexing off-speed shots.

It was about as much fun as I've ever had playing Foosball, and honestly, we may have taken five of six but every possession and game were close (besides one, where we shut them out). I'd say it was Foosball on steroids, but that be a bit cliche, although there was a lot of yelling and hooting and hollering. Mostly from yours truly.

After our six games, we were totally ready to rock. Sadly, Rock Band was not in the Swing Bar at Koots like we thought, with the wide open spaces of that bar but a dream as we had to go and play in the weird bar in the entry way of Koots. It's tight, confined spaces were not ideal for Bitchface's premiere, but in typical fashion for the band, we persevered if only in the name of rock.

Of course, the situation wasn't helped by the fact the first song we played Jason had to drum on lefty mode (as we didn't know how to switch) and myself and Jon were using sub-par house guitars. We're used to having room to move, kick, and dance with my wide open living room and our two cordless guitars. This was with a Guitar Hero 2 wired controller (bleh!) and a Rock Band wired controller (even worse than the first!).

From left: Random stranger, Jason, and Amy rocking at Koots

But that's enough for excuses. We still totally rocked, starting off with old standby "Wanted Dead or Alive" by Bon Jovi, which I totally blew at to start (the intro always bugs me on expert) but picked it up and we manged to do OK. We followed it up with a far better run through on "War Pigs" by Black Sabbath and then an even better yet rendition of Oasis' classic ballad "Wonderwall," which we even had an audience member sing along to (thanks guy!!).

About that point a guy came over and bugged us to let him play, and I let him take my spot. He was not good, as he played on medium and forced crappy songs on the band, bringing our overall appeal down. Bad stranger!

However, after two songs he departed and Bitchface ended our inaugral performance with a rousing rendition of Weezer's classic track off the Blue Album, "Say It Ain't So." All four of us played expert, and we finished at 90% (Jason on drums, rock on!), 96% (myself on guitar), 97% (Jon on bass), and 98% for our showoff, diva of a lead singer Amy. Five stars, foooo shoooo.

All in all, it was a great experience. It won't necessarily be an every week thing, but it was definitely a lot of fun. I really hope someone puts on a Rock Band competition that we can participate in, as that was what we were really hoping for. However, we did the best with what we had and we had a great night. Even better, it was a ton of fun and I spent $1 (on Foosball) and all that I had to drink was about 10 glasses of water.

Oh Tuesdays...how I love thee.

Foosball Table!

Tuesday, April 1, 2008


This was another April Fools joke, a dumb one to remind readers that my previous post was highly like to be an April Fools joke as well. Seriously, who would buy a 22 person Foosball table? It's not in the vicinity of practical, and frankly, it'd be pretty stupid. I have to admit though, I thought about the rules a bit and decided that I think if the goalie scored the game would immediately be over. That would be pretty incredible. Regardless, Happy April Fools Day!

So I finally got my table. I spent all morning trying to find a table because I had nothing else to do, and I picked up this table off Craig's List. Sure it was $500, but I can have 22 people play on it at one time! Seems like a perfect fit...well, for anything besides my apartment. I may have to move to make it fit.

Oh Summer, how I cannot wait for you...

Friday, March 28, 2008

Best band picture ever

The prospects for this upcoming summer continue to improve and improve. What do we have on our plate now? Another big concert coming up to Alaska this summer for one, as Alternative/Country/Rock/Indie gods Wilco are coming up to play at Moose's Tooth's 12th anniversary show. Moose's Tooth's summer concert series continues to be an out and out success, and with Wilco they have pulled in someone with a ridiculous amount of critical credibility and commercial success. I like some of their material, have not delved deeply into their vast discography, but I've heard they are fantastic live and I am excited to see them.

The point is, hooray for good concerts in Alaska! Apparently even the people in the lower 48 know Alaska is WAY better in the summer.

Additionally, on a more personal (as I will share Wilco with many others) and long term note, I'm getting a Foosball table this weekend. I've been horribly, horribly addicted to playing it on weekends, spending quarter after quarter for hours and I decided it just makes good financial sense to get one. This will lead to realigning my apartment for the first time since moving in, so it's going to be really exciting. I can't wait!