But Can It Knock A Door Down?

Every so often I skim the subject lines of the spam in my various Gmail accounts*, this one really stood out.

Click to enlarge. (Pun not intended, but made anyway.)

What are some of your favorite amusing spam subject lines?

* I've got three Gmail accounts...
1) The main one listed on the sidebar. Site mails and most personal correspondence.
2) A "serious" one that's just my first initial and last name, which I use for things like banking, Amazon, etc. The spam mail above came to this one, which is why I blocked out the address.
3) A junk address that I use for some website registrations and when I enter contests online. Basically one that catches all the junk mail that comes with those sorts of things.

Links For 1-8-2009

Massive link post today.

Entertainment

There's lots of rumors going around that NBC is going to dump Leno back into 11:30 to keep the affiliate stations happy. While it'd be nice to think that means they realized they made a mistake and will put some quality scripted shows in that 10pm slot, it more than likely means that slot will be filled more LAW AND ORDER spin-offs, BIGGEST LOSER and CELEBRITY APPRENTICE episodes. While I don't like Leno at all, the best solution would instead to be either put him at 11:30, or cut him down to twice a week. Like Friday and one other dead night in the schedule. (I guess Thursday would make sense since that's NBC's sitcom night and Leno is supposed to be "comedy". Unfunny, hack comedy, but comedy.) All that's certain is NBC says its committed to improving Leno performance and that they plan to keep Conan.

LOST premiere 'threatened by Obama'. The State of the Union address could pre-empt LOST. The State of the Union could be summarized in a few sentences: "Economy still shit. Airline safety a joke, and now even more inconvenient. Health care still a mess, and will continue to be because big corporations don't want their profits in that area to decay. Democratic President just as ineffective as a Republican would be, it'd just be different people complaining about a different guy." There, I just saved you 30-60 minutes of your life.

Of course, there's the inevitable futile gesture: Fans campaign against LOST delay. Because, yeah, the White House cares about interrupting LOST. Pfft.

LOST producers admit to 's**t' episodes. I'm thinking they mean much of season two and the first few episodes of season three. From the the second quarter of season three on it's been pretty awesome.

Producers: 'LOST sequel a possibility'. Translation: "We know eventually somebody will remake or 'reimagine' the show."

Matt Smith: 'My Doctor is less tolerant'. I can't imagine a Doctor less tolerant that Hartnell or Colin Baker. Their Doctors were written in perpetual annoyance mode.

Meanwhile, due to one throwaway line, the BBC had to issue a statement... BBC: 'DOCTOR WHO not anti-ginger'. Why are people so thin-skinned? Unbelievable. (Apparently the complainers are ignoring the fact that the last companion and new one are both redheads.)

Over at Bleeding Cool... More DOCTOR WHO stuff – writers, pics, all that. Mmmm... Karen Gillan.

Over at TV Squad they've got a nice opinion piece about how poorly the 10th Doctor was written: Give thanks that Davies' Doctor Who finally regenerated. I agree with all of this, and have tons more complaints. For a show that returned so strong with the 9th Doctor, it really lost me with the way 10 was written. (No offense to David Tennant, who's a really talented actor. He just worked with what he was given. His Doctor became one of my least favorites, which is a shame because he had so much potential. I find it strange that he's apparently replaced Tom Baker as the iconic Doctor to a lot of people.)

MTV planning DAWN OF THE DEAD spin-off TV series. Based on the remake movie, not the original. Could be the only thing I'd ever try out on MTV.

HEROES will be back next season (says Greg Grunberg). If any of you still care. I can't believe they're going to continue beating that dead horse. Still, as long as they don't cancel CHUCK and keep HEROES, I won't complain too much.

Artie Lange stabbed himself nine times, say sources. Oh my god. That's insane.

Warner Bros props up decaying DVD market with Netflix pact. Netflix has agreed to delay Warner Bros.' new DVDs for 28 days. Remember when movies would come out for rental months before you could buy them? Now things have done a complete 180.

Misc Stuff

90 percent of languages will be extinct next century - and that's good. I think it would be a good, if incredibly impractical, thing for everybody on Earth to speak one language. It would make things so much easier. Of course, making everybody on the planet learn a new language after a lifetime of speaking their own local language would be incredibly hard to do.

Pure Awesomeness: fan made War Machine costume. Normally cosplay makes my eyes automatically roll,* but that's incredibly sweet costume.

* Except for when Olivia Munn was dressed up as Emma Frost and slave Leia. Unf. That was awesome.

Video Games

Rumor: Infinity Ward won't be making MODERN WARFARE 3. As I read this I let out a shriek that made the dog run to hide under a table.

Next CALL OF DUTY rumored to be set for November release. It's supposedly a Vietnam game, instead of yet another World War II game. That might make me pick up a non-Infinity Ward, non-MODERN WARFARE COD title.

FINAL FANTASY XIII may be last of 'this type of game' for Square Enix. I don't imagine they'll retire the FINAL FANTASY series, but maybe they'll update the style of play for the games.

Wada on piracy and “Japan is over” quip. I think it's good that the Japanese game companies are looking to expand their horizons a bit. I think a lot of companies over there have gotten a bit stagnant. I do think Capcom and Konami have been doing interesting stuff, but Square has been dropping the same game with a different coat of paint over and over for decades now.

Square Enix says Japanese retail "prejudiced" against western games. Man, this guy sure has a lot to say. This is an interesting thought though. It was always assumed that games and consoles made overseas didn't sell well in Japan because the people there weren't interested in foreign game product. (Which I always thought weird, since lots of Japanese people love US movies and music.)

Capcom says hardcore gamers have disowned the Wii. It is kinda sad that shovelware sells better than quality games on that system.

Capcom (try to) back away from anti-Wii comments. Why? They just stated the obvious. The Wii is for casual gamers: little kids, older people that normally aren't into games and families. Nintendo is and should be proud of that. Attempts at titles aimed at gamers who primarily play on the Xbox 360 or PS3 usually don't sell well on the Wii. That's a simple fact.

Yes, ALAN WAKE is getting DLC. What doesn't have DLC these days?

Yarr!

Hollywood appeals decision not to shutdown OpenBitTorrent. Shockingly enough, the courts didn't want to shut down a website based on a bunch of corporations suspicions and wanted actual proof. What sort of madness is this? Clearly Hollywood didn't get their bribes in on this one.

January Is Only A Week Old And Awful

I added up which starting hands I was losing the majority of this money with, and with one or two exceptions it was all AA-JJ, and AK. You know, the hands that most people actually make money with. Nothing like reraising your opponent all-in preflop with KK and he calls with 99 and flops a set. (This happened to me earlier today.)

Links For 1-6-2010

Entertainment

BBC: Don't worry about the new WHO. DOCTOR WHO is a cash cow for the BBC internationally, of course they'll keep it going. Plus it's an institution.

Is Cobra Commander getting a casual makeover? This would've been a better redesign for the movie that the horrible look they went with. It's a guy in a hood or wearing a helmet with a chrome covered face. How do you screw that up?

This might be helpful for my pal Eric: Everything you need to know about LOST in 8 minutes and 15 seconds

Sam Mendes to direct the 23rd James Bond film. This is an interesting choice.

Fox picks up new Shawn Ryan cop drama. If it's even half as good as THE SHIELD, I'll have to check it out.

Confirmed: ZOMBIELAND writers to pen DEADPOOL. I've always thought Deadpool was a bit over-rated personally.

Video Games

Modders drag HALF-LIFE 2's graphics kicking & screaming into 2010. Personally, while this is cool, I think HALF-LIFE 2 has aged well. Much better than the first game, for example.

Capcom's France Boss: "The future is on PS3 and 360".

Yarr!

Finnish label will not sign more artists until piracy stops. Aren't they only hurting themselves? Any artsists that might've signed with them will either sign with somebody else, or do it all themselves, which is the way of the future anyway.

$675,000 RIAA file sharing verdict is ‘unreasonable’. It is utterly ridiculous.

Links For 1-5-2010

Rational Behavior

McNuggets Rage. "Cops: Woman put fist through drive-thru window over chicken beef." Is it me, or are the more of these stories all the time out there?

Entertainment

Sony accidentally releases ARMORED via PlayStation Store, for free. Honestly, I think it would be cool if they randomly did stuff like this on purpose. Take a movie in theaters and then make it available for free for a limited time without announcement. Provided the movie didn't suck it could generate good word of mouth for the movie, and people would be more interested in the movies section of the Playstation store.

Figuring out DOCTOR WHO's lingering mysteries. Or all the stuff Davies was too lazy to explain. (I did cave and watch the entire second part of the finale on OnDemand earlier today.)

Video Games

Sega 'probably not' making more hardcore Wii games. Makes sense. The Wii is more for casual gamers, let's be honest. Nothing wrong with that.

Capcom worried about anti-videogame 'smear campaigns'. It's interesting to hear a company (aside from Rockstar) address the issue.

What GRAND THEFT AUTO could perform theft on. A few games that GTA could learn from, including GTA's clone SAINTS ROW.

There are responsible parents out there. These sound like people who won't be blaming video games if their kids do something bad. On the other hand...

39% of British parents let kids play adult games. The parents in this same poll also let their kids watch movies that were rated beyond their age level as well.

Yarr

Money expert: industry should compete with music piracy. But... but... that would make... sense! So clearly, they can't do that. It's baffling that legal online music is overpriced when you realize that disc and packaging manufacturing and shipping costs are eliminated. Well, it's not baffling once you realize that the prices are high out of pure greed.

Bono: We should use China's censorship as an example of how to stop piracy. I've always thought he was smug and arrogant, now I can add idiot to that list as well. Awesome. Besides, he clearly doesn't know... How China's attempts to censor the internet are failing. Moron.

Will France's three strikes law matter? No, whether it were to happen now, or be delayed like it has been. I hope it's a huge failure so other countries realize how futile and stupid a gesture it is to pass such a law.

Let Me Help You Sleep

Mundane things that I've been up to? Okay...

Video Games

I finished off both UNCHARTED games. I'm really glad I got them. The game play is fun and the story manages to hook you in. They also both felt a bit longer than average these days, as far as the single-player campaign went.

The one gripe that I had about the second game is that it looked horrible with the PS3 upscaling it to 1080p. I had to set my PS3 to display 720p and then it looked fine. I didn't have that problem with the first game. Or if I did, I sure didn't notice it as much as I did with 2. Really this isn't a big deal, but you'd think they'd make the game compatible with 1080p.

One thing I do sort of regret is blazing my way through both games in the span of a week. This leaves me with nothing new to play until BIOSHOCK 2 and SPLINTER CELL: CONVICTION come out. (Thinking of getting BIOSHOCK 2 for the PS3 instead of the 360 like I originally planned. I have over a month to decide.)

Poker

Been playing pretty much break even. If I have a losing session, I make it back a session or two later, but then lose it again. Given how badly I've been running since Thanksgiving, I'm thinking that my game has some massive leaks in it. Then when I review my biggest losing hands, I'm usually a favorite (in odds) preflop through the turn and get rivered. I'm losing big chunks of money with hands like pocket Kings or Queens with idiots sucking out with trash. Still, I'm always looking to improve. I haven't been studying as much as I usually do because I've been screwing around with the PS3 and minding the puppy.

Puppy

I had my first "accident", stepping in dog crap and tracking it in the house. No matter how good of a job you do trying to clean it up from the yard after bringing the dog back in, some will escape your notice in the dark.

On the other hand, Lucy (that's the puppy) has gotten much better about not going in the house, and generally lets you know when she needs to go out. Tonight, she exploited that a little bit by acting like she needed to go, and made me go outside so she could run around in the snow without doing her business. I might've been less annoyed by that if I wasn't in the middle of playing poker at the time and had to sit out for two or three orbits.

Puppy hiccups are both hilarious and adorable.

Reading, Watching

This was a dead comics week, but I've recently been reading Garth Ennis' run on HELLBLAZER. I ignored it when it came out back when I worked at the comics shop. But I recently read the DARK ENTRIES graphic novel (which oddly enough came out under the Vertigo Crime line, which is why I read it), and enjoyed it and that was a Constantine story. When I finish those issues, I might pick up some of the other stuff.

I haven't been watching much stuff. I've still got a few Christmas Blu-rays that I haven't gotten around to doing much more than taking the shrink wrap off of them.