Week in Review - Less than Stellar Edition

What a week it's been! The week started off alright, with work going relatively smoothly on Monday, but quickly made a downward turn when it was discovered that we had no hot water at our house. Before our kids, this would be an inconvenience, as two professional adults could make do, and deal with the hassle until we could find proper help. With two kids, and the mountains of clothes they go through, the bottles and dishes that need to be washed, the baths that need to be taken, and so forth, this is a big problem. I went down to investigate the issue. If you were to know anything about me, it's that I'm not very handy around the house, so me looking at the water heater is like a first-grader looking at a rocket. Sure, it looks shiny and cool, but I couldn't tell you the first thing about how it works or where to start troubleshooting the problem. I eventually made my way to the bottom of the unit (the heat in this case is provided by natural gas as opposed to electricity), and found that the pilot was out. Using the directions conveniently placed on the side of the tank, I was able to get the heater working again. My mind registered the dried up trail of what clearly was water leading away from the bottom of the unit, brushing it aside as an old leak...

About an hour later, I went back down into the basement to check to see how the heater was doing, and lo and behold, the bottom of the unit was surrounded with water. Clearly, this is why the pilot went out. That will teach me to ignore the warning signs in the future. To make a long story short, I stayed home from work the next day, and $925 later my problem was solved. The new heater works well, too well in fact. The old unit was becoming less and less able to heat the water, so we've been living with cooler and cooler water. This new unit, even at the factory preset of what should be around 115 degrees, provides water hot enough to cook meat on the bone. I've since turned it down twice just to make it tolerable.

To add to the fun of that day, I then had to attend a planning board hearing in one of the towns I'm working with, to present information in defense of a special permit application. The residents in the area got the wrong impression of what the hearing was being held to accomplish, and 30 or 40 people came in very angry and misinformed. That's a really bad combination. What should have taken less than 20 minutes and been an open and shut issue turned into an hour of unpleasant questions and people ignorant of the issue at hand spouting off about unrelated topics and generally making trouble. That's New England town government for you...

On the upside, I did have the opportunity at some point during the week (it was Wednesday evening, if I remember correctly) to catch an episode of UFC Unleashed, chronicling the fight between Wanderlei Silva and Chuck Liddell. Being a relative novice to the UFC scene, this was definitely one of the better fights I'd seen, from the level of intensity of both participants and the skill displayed by both men. It was also my first experience seeing Liddell fight, after having read about him in magazines and such. I have to admit, the more I watch MMA, the more I enjoy the whole experience, and it's clear that this has supplanted the WWE for people's entertainment dollar. I could be wrong on this, but the buzz around MMA seems to be far greater than around professional wrestling these days. That's another topic, though, to be discussed another day.

The Red Sox pulled off a huge comeback last night to force Game 6 in Tampa on Saturday. I'll admit that I was long asleep when the rally came, and I had fully expected to wake up today to the eulogy of the 2008 season, but live to fight another day. This could end up being just like last year, where the Sox were down to the Indians 3-1, then came back to take the ALCS and then sweep the World Series, but even to force a Game 7 is a tall order. James Shields has been a nightmare for Sox hitters, and who knows which Josh Beckett will show up on Saturday. If any team can do it, though, it's this one, so hope is never lost.

Also during this week, I've made progress in Half Life 2. I currently stand near the beginning of the antlion area in the 'Sandtraps' stage, where I've helped the Resistance forces fight off the attack at the lighthouse and traveled down the cliff path to the beach. The poor schmuck acting as lookout has been killed by the antlions, and I've jumped on a few rocks to get to the beach. It was there I saved and shut down for the night. I'm rapidly approaching where I stopped playing the last time, just after entering Nova Prospekt. If I'm not mistaken, that area of the game is after working through the antlion area. I'm still just as bad at shooters as I always was, but the story and experience are worth working through this game.

It has been written many times about the characters in Half Life 2, and how well they are brought to life and voiced in such a way as to make the player care about them. One example that really stuck out for me during this playthrough was the character of Father Gregori, the hermit who helps you through the Ravenholm area. The voice acting was great, and I really started to care for the guy, so much so in fact that I didn't want to leave him when he held the gate open to the mine for me. As the gate closed behind me, he yelled something about his congregation and laughed. Turning back at the entrance to the mine area, the steams of headcrab zombies could be seen making their way toward him, so many that it was clear he wasn't going to make it. Even though it was just a game, and a scripted event within that game, I turned quickly and entered the mine area, because I didn't want to see what happened. For a brief moment, I had the sinking feeling in my stomach that I couldn't do anything to save him. That moment made me realize just how well-crafted the story and characters are in this game, and gave me a newfound appreciation for the fine art of storytelling in this medium.

So, what are you going to be playing this weekend? I intend to make my way through Half Life 2, and also to finish up Portal, which I started earlier in the week. After that, I'm thinking about a change of pace to something a more lighthearted and fun. This is probably a good opportunity to check out some of the free games on the Internet, as some of them show real promise. I also am looking to 'cleanse the palette,' if you will, with the release of Fallout 3 only a little over a week away. Any suggestions?