Today's Note 11/18/20

Good afternoon everyone,

Had a nice Fitness Boxing session to start the day, really liking the groove I'm staying in keeping the settings on Strength and Cardio at 35 minuets, counting stretching sometimes that pushes up to 39 minuets. Of course as some days have proven, it can be below 35 minutes in length, but hey it's the daily routine, staying consistent is key.I will admit however, that sometimes my eating habits do kind of most certainly counter act any of my workout efforts, I'm a snacker in the worse possible sense of the term. If I hang out in the kitchen I'll end up chewing on something or other. What can I say some habits are easy to get into and others are impossible to stop.

Anyway, Overwatch has a new event running until November 30, called Symmetra’s Restoration Challenge, which basically is win 9 matches and get a new icon, spray and skin / costume for Symmetra. Since I typically don't play damage dealers in normal Quick Play matches, the only chance I'd have of being able to have her wear it is in Mystery Heroes or Mayhem matches if I straight up refuse to be a tank or support. Granted I'll switch to one of those depending on how things are going. Anyway the new skin for Symmetra is nice, but she's a rather bland character normally, with everything about her being based around 'perfect alignments' and everything in being in order. Note for the screen shot you see I had to do some editing to it to make it stand out from the background

Last night's stream was a return of The Division 2 as I tagged along with PowerThumbz and Iceman7667 in helping with the latest Manhunt things. There were laughs to be had for sure, most at Thumbz expense. Took me a little bit of time to remember how to play since The Division 2 is not a game I load up often when off-stream gaming... or at all for that matter.

Tonight we'll be back to Mass Effect, and we're heading to Noveria and dealing with everything associated with it, which probably will include the added side quests. Even though I already have the achievements for playing the majority of the game with Wrex and Tali, we'll continue to keep them in the party because damn it it's Wrex and Tali! 

And what will wrap up today's notes, we'll see ya later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

Today's Notes 11/17/20

Good afternoon everybody,

It's amazing how waking up early one day often means I'm waking up late as hell the next day, but... wait did I mention this just a few days ago? I probably did, goes to show I have very little in my puny brain.

Anyway, had a nice Fitness Boxing session today, still on Strength and Cardio at the recommended 35 Minuet setting. Had some slight issues with the Nintendo Switch's blue-tooth style wireless tracking which meant some of my misses were not actually misses but oh well. You know what's also interesting is that Fitness Boxing has a lot of unlockables for reaching various goals. And probably about the end of December, hell maybe even sooner than that I'd have him all unlocked. Probably will do that before getting Fitness Boxing 2 which comes out in a couple of weeks.

Last night's stream of Mass Effect was pretty awesome, as we cleared out Feros, primarily using the HMWSG weapon, which is basically a shotgun, granted I was using the basic variant of it, but it has given me some thought as to future play-throughs of this game. You see the PC version does not have achievements, or at least ones that can be shown to give an idea of how many people unlocked certain ones... the console versions do however, and while some require Shepard to be either be Biotic and Tech focus (such as Adept or Engineer class), there are some focused on difficult setting, namely finishing the game on Hardcore and Insanity difficult. If I can grab all the mastered version of the HMWSG and its sister gear and get a better handle on using Shepards powers I might be able to do it. Just need to make sure Shepard is at level 60 to do it on a "New Game+"and just focus flat out on the big missions.

Following last night's stream I loaded up Spock Vs Q through Audible, basically a two-man play featuring the voices of Leonard Nimoy and John De Lancie, and while it's more than twenty years old, it is an enjoyable listen, particularly with Spock just owning Q through pure logic.Highly recommend you give it a listen.

More than likely tonight's stream will focus on The Division 2, as Iceman and PowerThumbz will be working on some things in the game and so I'll just tag along to 'help' out. Could be an interesting night of bad things happening in a video game.

And on that note, we'll wrap this up! Catch ya later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden

 

Today's Notes 11/16/20

Good afternoon everyone,

Actually was up before 8:30 AM, and I just love it when I call someplace as soon as they open and there's the automatic message that basically says call back tomorrow because of call volume.... I'm like dude, you just opened! I've worked in call-centers, everyone should be ready to go as soon as the day starts! Still at least I was able to get myself put in line for them to call me back!

So since I was up early, we did do a bonus stream of Fitness Boxing, Animal Crossing New Horizons and Super Mario 35 (in that order). The Fitness Boxing session was solid with hook and upper cut combos, finishing with a defensive combo. With ACNH, it was just roaming the island for the daily patrol job and such, and in Super Mario 35, came in second in the one run we did there, if I had more time I probably would've came in first, but oh well.

Last night's Overwatch's stream was pretty much Quick Plays and Mystery Heroes, with the big highlight being on back to back matches, PandaSweet got plays of the games as Hanzo. We ended up going 5 and 5 losses in the final 10 matches of the night, with the night ending on a win. 

Tonight's plans are for more Mass Effect, with the focus turning to either Feros or Noveria, bot sure which one I'll do first. Either way depending on when I start (as it relates to work) we may end up doing both, but we'll see how that rolls out as things have been quite slowly lately, but I was told things are expected to pick back up. Still, last night I did knock out the Sniper related achievement while also learning that the biotic and tech powers achievements cannot be done by using the squad members, meaning I'd have to create two more version of Shepard to accommodate those skill sets

And that wraps this up, time to grab some lunch!

Today's Notes 11/15/20

 Good afternoon everyone...

You know that feeling when you wake up incredibly early the previous day and then the next day you don't get up until like after 12:30 PM? Yeah that happened to me lol. 

Of course I made sure to get todays Fitness Boxing session done, but I forgot to get the normal screen shots that showed not only the overall score but what sets were done, so today's results are just the generic one from the daily results screen. Still was a solid workout I think.

Last night Twitch Sings session was a lot of fun, we only went four hours and I thought about switching over to something else. but figured it was a good time to call it at 11 PM. This actually helps for next week as I only have a handful of songs left on my favorites list to try and do on expert difficulty, and I can split those between normal sing backs.I also thought about opening up a part but for whatever reason Twitch Sings has become incredibly glitchy, its as iff it's shutting down at the end of the year

I did load up Mass Effect to tackle the Pinnacle Station DLC, which I remember on the PC version to be a pain in the ass to deal with.... so imagine my surprise when I see that the console version is actually easier to deal with! Find me in the alps I was shocked I managed to get through the timed trails... then again, I realized there was a sprint button if you hold A on the Xbox controller, which reveals the fact that I basically go in normally guns a blazing and slug it out... which isn't too bad because on the PC version there are the hot-keys that allow for total spamming of powers and abilities.

My annoyance with the United States Postal Service grows as when I go to check on a delivery that is already late, they removed the 'time estimated for delivery' and leaves a message of 'Don't worry it'll get to you eventually'. Once again this falls on the shoulders of one Donald J. Trump and his attempts to sabotage the 2020 elections in his favor.

Tonight we'll be playing Overwatch, and we'll see what fun we'll have, in terms of Arcade Modes or just Quick Plays. I have been using McCree alot in Mayhem matches since his flash bang can disrupt Winston, Wrecking Ball and to a lesser extent Doomfist. Anyway that stream will will start at about 7 PM EST over on twitch.tv/fredcasden.

 

Best of the Week 11/8-14/20

Here are the best moments from the week of November 8-14, 2020 for my twitch channel (http://twitch.tv/fredcasden). Featured content was Fitness Boxing, Animal Crossing New Horizons, Super Mario Bros 35, Overwatch, Mass Effect, Star Trek Online and Twitch Sings!

  

Quick Thoughts; The Blues Brothers

Last week we didn't do a watch along over in my discord channel, but I believe we made up for it in a big way this week with The Blues Brothers starring John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd. Released in 1980, it is without debate the greatest movie based on characters created for Saturday Night Live, and probably the greatest musical comedy of all time. Yes that's right, The Blues Brothers is a musical, with entire sequences of characters breaking out into song and dance routines. Anyway, the version we watched this we was the extended cut which added in a lot of scenes and details to make the narrative of the plot move a lot smoother, and explaining various details that were not a part of the original theatrical cut, which also meant a number of the music performances were longer as well.

One of the first thoughts that came to mind this week was, is there a better driver in a work of fiction than Elwood Blues? Think about it, in the world of the Movies and TV shows, Elwood is pretty much untouchable with his skills as a driver with a 1974 Dodge Monaco Sedan that was modified for police use and that's it. Probably the closest would be Nicholas Cage's character of Randall Raines in Gone in 60 Seconds with what was done with a 1967 Ford Shelby GT500. For those who will bring up any of the characters in the Fast and Furious Franchise, lets also point out the cars they mostly used were heavily modified within the context of that universe.

Movie forward, in regards to Carrie Fisher's character 'The Mystery Woman'... where and how does she get every weapon she intended to use to take out Joliet Jake? Think about it, she uses a rocket launcher, a flamethrower, an assault riffle and takes down part of a city block with demolition charges! Hell how did she set that up!Also of note, I still love the fact that the name of the salon 'The Mystery Woman' is at when she is reading up on how to use the flamethrower is called 'Curl Up & Dye'.... sometimes the simplest puns are the best.

One of the extra scenes in the Extended cut involves Curtis telling the Band that Jake and Elwood intentions and motivations for getting the band back together and donating the money from the Palace Hotel gig to cover the taxes of the Orphanage... and while it gives even more context to the Band continuing to play as Jake and Elwood make their escape, it does raise a question. What if instead of saying 'We're On A Mission From God', Jake and Elwood explained to the band as they were recruiting them their intentions.Yes some of the set ups for things like Aretha Franklin' 'Think' out, but I think if that is moved up to be earlier than it was with Elwood saying 'We're On A Mission From God', she'll still go forward into song and then follow that with Jake explaining the situation, it would take some of the awkwardness of Matt Guitar Murphy just walking out on her with Blue Lou Marini following shortly after. Plus It would put a moral dilemma on Mr. Fabulous Alan Rubin's character in the fancy restaurant that he doesn't want to leave his job. Hell if anything, all these circumstances involving the Nazis, the cops and the Good Ol Boys can still work as is

Anyway, that's my quick thoughts here on The Blues Brothers.... maybe next week we'll watch Blues Brothers 2000?

Today's Notes 11/14/20

Good Morning Everybody...

Holy shit it is morning as I'm actually writing this, well when you are expecting something through the United States Postal Service to arrive, one gets very eager and wakes up early... then they check the tracking and see that the USPS says it's going to arrive later than they expected. You know up until Donald J. Trump's fucking around with the Postal Service to try and steal the 2020 election, I've never seen anything tracked through the USPS being listed as 'arriving late'.

Speaking of that orange face clown, does one realize how fucking warped he has made people who call themselves Republicans? Take Tommy Tuberville for example, who went on the record and said in World War II, America was fighting against socialism which is about as wrong as wrong can get. America was fighting against FASCISM! But I guess when you aligned yourself with Trump, being anti-fascist is a bad thing to these fucking idiots. And don't get me started on that buffoon Marjorie Taylor Greene who went on Twitter to cry about CrossFit gyms being closed when in fact they are OPEN. 

Anyway, last night we did another Mass Effect stream, and as we get closer to the end of Twitch Sings, getting into the groove of dedicating more than two nights a week to a big game is really coming together. Of course during last night's stream we managed to knock out even more of the side-quests including the Bringing Down The Sky DLC, which depending on your background / career selections for Shepard when creating them, adds a bit to their story and history with the Batarians. Also since I haven't gone to Feros and Noveria yet, I already have acquired the first set of Spectre weapons (which unlocks when unlocking the 'Rich' achievement) which means things are gonna get quite easier when dealing with enemies that rush towards me. 

Today's Fitness Boxing Session was a strength and cardio session at the max recommended time length of 35 minuets. Felt good finishing it, and damn I've been doing this for 131 consecutive days. You know originally the plan was to do Just Dance daily, but the lack of a good sight line to my main monitor prevented that. Probably a complete break down and reorganizing of my computer and consoles is in order to make that possible.

 

Tonight's stream over on twitch.tv/fredcasden will start with Twitch Sings, and we may do some other things too depending on how my mood strikes me.