Hey there, blogaholics. It's Friday, which means you can have some more delicious blogahol. Last week, I alluded to the fact that I had a plan for daily update schedule. I thought I would take some time today and talk to you about it. I wanted to discuss this earlier in the week, but a combination of Labor Economics, Linear Algebra, gray cats, and Gears of War 3 meant that this was the first time I really had clear to blog. Without further ado, let's get to the proposed blogging schedule!
Week of English Muffin Power Hour
Video Game Mondays
Top Five Tuesdays
Fantasy Football Wednesdays
Toss-up Thursdays
Wild Card Friday
Adventure Story Saturdays
Silly Video Sundays
Now that I've revealed the schedule, let's talk in detail about each category. Video Game Mondays was something I was hesitant to add, because I know there are few things more boring to my non-gamer readership than video games. That said, I also have a freaking huge back catalog of content here and gaming is rapidly becoming a part of mainstream life. So I'm not an oddball for liking Halo and talking about how much I enjoy playing Halo with friends. I'm an oddball because I have an almost encyclopedic memory of Halo.
Total tangent here, but I'm actually the #1 Google search result for "Almost too shocked for words" (first out of nearly 86 million results, mind you). You may notice that the rest of the first page results are from the Halopedia. Draw what conclusions you will.
But I digress. The point is talking at length about video games is no challenge for me and, especially considering how crazy my Mondays are this year, this is a good thing. I can update this regularly. The Iron Dirigible updates showed me that I can still maintain a strong readership when I'm not talking strictly about comedy.
Top 5 Tuesdays and Toss Up Thursdays are both great concepts for blogging I had earlier this year. Sadly, I abandoned them because... I kinda forgot about them. But no more! Yes, the reason these updates are on Tuesday and Thursday is because of mnemonic devices. At times, I am a very simple man.
Fantasy Football Wednesdays have already happened 3 times, never on a Wednesday though. I got a lot of quality feedback from non-football junkies about the Iron Dirigible updates, so I'll keep posting that here. I'm sure my league will appreciate having regular updates.
Wild Card Fridays are there because I couldn't come up with another topic. This will be the closest to the old school style of English Muffin Power Hour, because I have almost nothing to do on Friday afternoons (except Tae Kwon Do). So expect this to be like the regular EMPH, but much, much better at kicking.
Adventure Story Saturdays are going to be tales of my adventures in Middle Tennessee. Silly Video Sundays are where I post a video I find funny, because Sundays are for football and/or homework and probably church. Really, the weekends are self-explanatory.
My main concern with this update schedule is quality control. I'm worried that the average length of articles would fall significantly with a daily update schedule. To that end, I'm considering cutting out the Saturday and Sunday articles. It would give me the weekend to work ahead (a stunning concept) and the weekend topics are definitely the weakest of the seven.
So how does that sound, readers? In either case, you're getting substantially more English Muffins than you're used to!
Friday, October 7, 2011
Friday, September 30, 2011
Week 3 Update: Suck it, Sam!
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| I said "Easy Rider"! Though both have Peter Fonda. |
The English Muffin Power Hour has never had double digit updates in the span of a single month. There are many reasons for this, such as me being easily distracted and the average EMPH update requiring me to spend my down time not playing Gears of War, not macking on the fine honeys, not tricking the Bean and not performing any combination of the three. One day, I will trick the Bean into letting me play Gears of War with a fine honey. I will have met my soul mate then. But I digress. The point is there are seasons where I don't update ten times, much less months. So I made a wager with Sam that I could update the EMPH ten times this month. If I didn't, then Sam would continue to mock my infrequent update schedule. If I did update ten times, then I'd win... um... I'd win... comedy? Let's just say I'd win comedy. I probably should have demanded some sort of stakes to this wager. I think I've been tricked.
In any case, if I don't write this update, then Sam gets an optimal outcome: more than the average dose of Hunterian Humor and bragging rights. But I'm not going to let that happen. You may beat me by 40 points in fantasy football, Sam, but you'll never take my freedom! My freedom to blog at whatever pace I feel like! CHAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGEEEE!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!
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| This is triumphant screaming. |
Thursday, September 29, 2011
BLARGH!!!
I see what you did there, fate. I was boasting about how I'd persevere through tough times and then the Braves go and blow a lead in the Ninth Inning and complete one of the biggest collapses in baseball history. While I watch. For thirteen innings. WHY?! WHY BRAVES WHY?! WHY DOES DEREK LOWE SUCK SO MUCH? WHY CAN'T ANYONE HIT TO SAVE THEIR SOUL? WHY DID BOURN TRY STEALING THIRD WITH NO ONE OUT?!
Excuse me. That was unprofessional. Anyways, the point is that not even the Braves' collapse can turn the English Muffin Power Hour into a hate-filled rant. Although even winning 1 in 3 games would have gotten us to the playoffs. And the terrible Houston Astros can mange to win 1 in 3 games. The terrible Houston Astros who beat the Braves in an 18 inning playoff game back in 2005, which precipitated the Braves' inglorious fall from grace. A fall from which they had only just recovered last year and now have managed to go back into shame and dishonor. I HATE ALL OF YOU CARDINALS! ADISUXCGHISUC! DYUWECGBOQGS!GYCUO! NL CENTRAL! ASTROS CAN'T DO ANYTHING! AAAAAA!! AAAAAA!!! AAAAA!!
But I will write about tonight's topic, even though I wore my rally cap and tomahawk chopped through the night and 2 OUTS WAS ALL WE NEEDED! HOW COULD YOU WALK 3 BATTERS IN AN INNING, KIMBREL?!
I'm officially at Bat Credit Card levels of mad.
Excuse me. That was unprofessional. Anyways, the point is that not even the Braves' collapse can turn the English Muffin Power Hour into a hate-filled rant. Although even winning 1 in 3 games would have gotten us to the playoffs. And the terrible Houston Astros can mange to win 1 in 3 games. The terrible Houston Astros who beat the Braves in an 18 inning playoff game back in 2005, which precipitated the Braves' inglorious fall from grace. A fall from which they had only just recovered last year and now have managed to go back into shame and dishonor. I HATE ALL OF YOU CARDINALS! ADISUXCGHISUC! DYUWECGBOQGS!GYCUO! NL CENTRAL! ASTROS CAN'T DO ANYTHING! AAAAAA!! AAAAAA!!! AAAAA!!
But I will write about tonight's topic, even though I wore my rally cap and tomahawk chopped through the night and 2 OUTS WAS ALL WE NEEDED! HOW COULD YOU WALK 3 BATTERS IN AN INNING, KIMBREL?!
I'm officially at Bat Credit Card levels of mad.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Iron Dirigible Week 2 Update: Update to the Future
If my calculations are correct, then this Iron Dirigible update is occurring precisely one hundred and sixty eight hours late. My experiment was a complete success! By typing at precisely 88 words per minute, the blog was able to generate the 1.21 jiggawatts of power required to activate the flux capacitor, which is what makes time travel possible. Who knows what strange future this update will find? Maybe Bean will have won a football game by now.
So readership of the distant future, let me tell you who were the Pimps and Gimps of the Week in the distant week of September 18th, 2011!
Pimps of the Week
Let me tell you the tale of Miles Austin, the fantasy football John Henry. See, the San Francisco 49ers had developed a steam powered secondary. And Miles Austin said "A man ain't nothing but a man, but before I let that steam secondary beat me down, I'll pull my hamstring with a hammer in my hand". And so Miles Austin caught pass after pass, touchdown after touchdown, and scored 34 points. That was nearly one-third of all of Team Gray's points in Week 2. And Team Gray needed every point as they just barely edged out the West Katzen Maus Munchers by two points. Unfortunately, this also meant that East Katzen was invaded and the Baron burninated the countryside, burninating all the peasants. But is there anything more pimp than providing me an opportunity to make a reference to Back to the Future, John Henry, and Trogdor all in the span of a few paragraphs? No, no there is not. Anyways, the downside is that Miles Austin did pull his hamstring and will be out about three weeks because of it.
Honorable Mentions: In my time, I would start with the honorable mentions first and build up to who the Pimp of the Week would be. But in the future, I'm confident that social media has dominated the world. By the time you read this sentence, you'll have 14 tweetbooks to read and repost on Googleopolis. My only hope is to lead with the interesting stuff.
Pimpmaster Doug had what I like to call the "Lonely Island Trio" going, with Vincent Jackson as Andy Samberg, Darren McFadden as Kiv Schaffer, Jahvid Best as Jorm Taccone, and Michael Bolton as Jack Sparrow.
Mad props also go to Team Tune, for winning a ridiculously exciting game 119-118. Better yet, Tune kept his pimp hand strong despite having two players (Kenny Britt and Peyton Hillis) score above 15 points. It helped that no one in his starting line up scored below nine points too.
Gimp of the Week
Half of the Velociraptors. Okay, I know it's not cool to keep picking myself for these awards but I seriously could not make a better case for anyone else. I had 5 of my 9 starters combine for just six points. The other half of my team managed to put together 69 points. I know everyone can't be Tom Brady good, but I'd settle for slightly competent. Even if the Underachieving half just a very disappointing 5 points per player, the Velociraptors would have finished with a much more respectable score. Can I declare this half of my team apocryphal?
Also worthy of dishonors are Deangelo Williams and the Bills Defense. Deangelo Williams made a strong case since, despite his impressive pedigree, he only managed an awful three points. If he had scored a below average six points, then the Maus Munchers would have won and Miles Austin would have been denied the triple threat of Trogdor, John Henry, and Back to the Future. So maybe it's for the best.
The Bills finished with -4 points, which is always worth serious consideration for Gimp of the Week. After all, the Bills defense was so terrible that they form a black hole of sucking that drains the points from nearby players. However, Bean's team also lost by 52 points. So it's not like the Bills would have impacted the final result a great deal one way or the other.
So readership of the distant future, let me tell you who were the Pimps and Gimps of the Week in the distant week of September 18th, 2011!
Pimps of the Week
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| You'd think dual wielding hammers would impeded catching a football. | You'd think wrong. |
Honorable Mentions: In my time, I would start with the honorable mentions first and build up to who the Pimp of the Week would be. But in the future, I'm confident that social media has dominated the world. By the time you read this sentence, you'll have 14 tweetbooks to read and repost on Googleopolis. My only hope is to lead with the interesting stuff.
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| Best Fantasy Pirate |
Mad props also go to Team Tune, for winning a ridiculously exciting game 119-118. Better yet, Tune kept his pimp hand strong despite having two players (Kenny Britt and Peyton Hillis) score above 15 points. It helped that no one in his starting line up scored below nine points too.
Gimp of the Week
Half of the Velociraptors. Okay, I know it's not cool to keep picking myself for these awards but I seriously could not make a better case for anyone else. I had 5 of my 9 starters combine for just six points. The other half of my team managed to put together 69 points. I know everyone can't be Tom Brady good, but I'd settle for slightly competent. Even if the Underachieving half just a very disappointing 5 points per player, the Velociraptors would have finished with a much more respectable score. Can I declare this half of my team apocryphal?
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| TROGDOOOOOOOR!!! TROGDOOOOOR!!!! |
The Bills finished with -4 points, which is always worth serious consideration for Gimp of the Week. After all, the Bills defense was so terrible that they form a black hole of sucking that drains the points from nearby players. However, Bean's team also lost by 52 points. So it's not like the Bills would have impacted the final result a great deal one way or the other.
Fall to Pieces
From the get go, let me be clear, this is not a normal English Muffin Power Hour update. I know there isn't a "normal" EMPH update by the regular definition, but normally they're lengthy, funny, and generally impersonal. I don't normally like writing about myself, because it comes off as self-absorbed and I prefer writing about things that are interesting. I also avoid writing about things which are melancholy because there's enough suckiness in the world today without me contributing.
The net effect of those beliefs is that when I feel sad, I don't blog. In fact, almost every lengthy stretch of time without blogging can be attributed to something bad happening to me. I won't go into detail about what's happening, but life has been very rough for me lately in pretty much every way. The kicker is that, without a lot of imagination, life could be a lot better than its ever been for me right now. I could go into detail, but I'm in no way comfortable with that. I will not be beaten down by these times, I promise you that.
The good news is I have a lot of real good ideas for updates. I know I've fallen behind on Iron Dirigible updates, but both of those will be written in the next 48 hours. I even have a tentative daily update schedule filled with subjects that I could write 500 words about at the drop of a hat. I mean, I'm not sure if I can keep up with such a schedule, but having ideas drafted out ahead of schedule will certainly help.
Well, I don't want to reveal my crazy schedule yet, and I can't come up with a funny conclusion. Instead, I leave you with one of my favorite songs made in the last ten years.
The net effect of those beliefs is that when I feel sad, I don't blog. In fact, almost every lengthy stretch of time without blogging can be attributed to something bad happening to me. I won't go into detail about what's happening, but life has been very rough for me lately in pretty much every way. The kicker is that, without a lot of imagination, life could be a lot better than its ever been for me right now. I could go into detail, but I'm in no way comfortable with that. I will not be beaten down by these times, I promise you that.
The good news is I have a lot of real good ideas for updates. I know I've fallen behind on Iron Dirigible updates, but both of those will be written in the next 48 hours. I even have a tentative daily update schedule filled with subjects that I could write 500 words about at the drop of a hat. I mean, I'm not sure if I can keep up with such a schedule, but having ideas drafted out ahead of schedule will certainly help.
Well, I don't want to reveal my crazy schedule yet, and I can't come up with a funny conclusion. Instead, I leave you with one of my favorite songs made in the last ten years.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Best Political Ad Ever
It starts slow but trust me, it's worth it. How can you not laugh at this video? It is the perfect blend of comedy: 50% serious political ad, 50% insanity. I could go on for a while about why this makes me laugh, but I'm running out of daylight to get a blog post in. I'll talk more tomorrow. Tonight, we laugh!
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