Originally written January of 2007.

Edited August of 2009.

This one reads more like a story.  Faith has been a huge issue for me lately, with events in my life leading me farther and farther along the path of Agnosticism.  At this point, I’d classify myself as a Strong Agnostic.

When I was young, I was innocent,
And everything seemed so clear.
My faith dicated by my parents,
And I lent an all too willing ear.

I went to all religious gatherings,
I prayed fervently with all my heart.
When the time came to do many things,
I ever so gladly played my part.

As I grew older I saw a great deal
That shook the foundations of my faith.
I saw a world crying out to be healed;
A world that had been right before my face.

I saw so many horrors and such pain
That I could not begin to understand,
And yet so many people refrained
From actively helping their fellow man.

I saw religion asking for money
To build their gluttonous rot,
Instead of helping the needy,
And providing for those who could not.

For one with such wide eyes,
For years I kept them closed,
Staying blind to the myriad lies
And the ways that they were posed.

I see nothing here but Hypocrisy,
Apathy, Greed, Arrogance, and Lies.
I pray to God, quite pointlessly,
For help before this world dies.

My lack of faith has naught but grown,
And nothing since has been the same.
And I know I can never condone
The atrocities done in God’s name.

Originally written March of 2007.

Edited and extended August of 2009.

Hypocrisy has run rampant
Across an apathetic world,
Whose dignity has been spent
By hearts, depressingly cold.

Disregard for our fellow man
In situations dark, and bleak,
Only serves to lend a helping hand
To the havoc which we wreak.

Death, Poverty, and Contention
Permeate our every day lives,
As people give concession
To materialistic greed and strife.

So many unspeakable acts
Perpetrated by all mankind,
Always callously backed
By the leaders who keep us blind.

As our world slowly descends
Into a state of deadly chaos,
Our very survival depends
On the values that once defined us.

We claim empathy and compassion
For those who live in pain.
But when asked to take action,
We have the gall to complain.

“What’s the point?”, we cry aloud.
“They’ll just spend it on booze!”
We merge swiftly into the crowd,
Not knowing what we lose.

Our humanity slowly slips away,
With every wicked, heinous act,
And there will come a painful day
When we can never get it back.

The world will continue rotating,
Becoming increasingly deranged.
If we spend our time only spectating,
We will never have significant change.

Give a shit about your world.
Help someone truly in need.
The smallest gesture,  unfurled,
Can be the most noble of deeds.

If you say something, fucking do it.

A few weeks ago, Lindsey and I rented Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe for our Xbox 360.  We generally like the vs. series of games (Marvel vs. Capcom, Capcom vs. SNK, etc), so we had high hopes.

We were severely disappointed.

The problem with Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe does not lie with the graphics.  there are some characters that do not look quite right, but overall, the graphics are very nice.  The problem comes from the gameplay, the story, the overwhelming introduction of a plethora of new powers and abilities, and the seeming laziness with which the game was programmed.

Gameplay first.  The gameplay is very uninteractive.  In Mortal Kombat: Deception, the Konquest mode allowed you to navigate the world en route to your next Mortal Kombat as a part of the story.  In MKvDCU, you are treated to a cutscene followed by Mortal Kombat…followed by a cutscene followed by Mortal Kombat followed by a cutscene followed by Mortal Kombat followed by what the fuck is wrong with Midway.

The story is another point that sticks in my craw.  Yeah.  I’m so miffed that I’m resorting to using a ridiculous idiom to express my displeasure.  The story, as I was saying, is awful.  There is no real introduction to why people are fighting, or what’s going on.  Dialogue is sparse.  New interactions usually consist of one or two sentences, followed by “FIGHT!”, followed by Mortal Kombat, followed by one or two sentences, followed by “FIGHT!”, followed by goddammit, I’m doing it again.  The story eventually unfolds to reveal that because of the actions of Superman defeating Darkseid, and Raiden defeating Shao Kahn, the two have fused into Dark Kahn (Lindsey and I prefer Shao Side).  As a result of this, the two universes are merging, causing havoc with shit that I really don’t care about.

Many of the characters come jam-packed with a ridiculous number of new abilities and powers.  Some of these powers and abilities are stolen from other characters.  Wonder Woman has moves from Sonya Blade.  Scorpion can apparently create a levitating duplicate of himself before teleporting, etc.  I miss the original Mortal Kombat games when characters had distinct powers and abilities, and they stuck with what the knew.

Laziness!  After a defeat, each character has their own little move to get back to their feet before the next round of fighting commences.  I’m sorry, did I say each character had their own move?  Actually, only two or three moves were programmed into the entire game, and the characters just share.  Green Lantern, Sonya Blade, and Wonder Woman all share the same stand-up between fights.  There are other laziness issues that I can’t remember, given the time gap.

As you can see from the pictures, the graphics are not awful.  Some of the character representations are very good, actually.  On the other hand, some don’t really look like who they are supposed to be, but I guess you can’t expect complete perfection.

For some reason, MKvDCU has been selling ridiculously well, which boggles my mind.  The game was awful.  Save your money and buy Tatsunoko vs. Capcom for the Wii.

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]

If you manage to walk away from Taken having learned one lesson, that lesson would be to never fuck with Liam Neeson.  If you do, you will die so hard that your ancestors will feel it.  Seriously.

Liam Neeson plays Bryan Mills, a retired CIA agent trying to get closer to his estranged daughter.  Plot setup ensues, and finally his daughter is kidnapped while on vacation in Paris.  He tracks down the unfortunate assholes who decided to fuck with Liam Neeson and proceeds to fuck their world up in a way that can only be described as “batshit crazy”.

Liam Neeson is not really the first actor to come to peoples’ minds when you think “batshit crazy, ex-CIA agent, who fucks up a bunch of people”.

WRONG.

Liam Neeson portrayed Bryan Mills incredibly.  He had intensity, he had the physical abilities, and he FUCKED PEOPLE UP IN A BATSHIT CRAZY MANNER (if I didn’t mention that already).

That’s his daughter.  She’s being held at knifepoint by an old perv who bought her from sex traffickers.  Liam Neeson is on the boat with them.  Old Perv dies.  Daughter is saved.

Watch this movie, please.

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]

Good afternoon, all!

As discussed on Episode 27 of the MehCast, we have been considering a schedule change for a little while now.  Friday is generally a busy night for people, and we’ve been turning down a lot of family and friend invites because of the show. Add onto that our lower Friday night viewer base, and you get a schedule change!

We’ll be moving the MehCast to Sundays at 2:00pm Pacific (5:00pm Eastern). We’ll give this time slot a trial run of at least three weeks, then decide what we’ll do from there! Make sure you come check us out @ http://www.justin.tv/worldofmeh/ and be sure to tell your friends about how much ass we kick!

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]

Confessor is the eleventh, and final, book in the Sword of Truth series.  Terry Goodkind brings his story to its ultimate conclusion in this gripping finale.

Confessor is the final book in the Chainfire trilogy, as well as the Sword of Truth series.  Richard has been captured by the Imperial Order, but they are unaware of his identity, thinking he is only a common individual.  Richard manages to escape, however, after causing a riot in the army camp.  Kahlan recovers her memory of who she is, but not of her past.  The Imperial Order has conquered all of the New World except for the final fortress of D’Hara, Richard’s capital.  Richard must find Kahlan, find the Sisters of the Dark and the magic of Orden, and defeat the military forces of the Old World before magic, and life, are stamped out.

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]

Phantom is the penultimate book in the epically long Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind.  The plot of the previous book, Chainfire, is continued and expanded upon in the tenth book of the series.

Phantom continues Richard’s search for his missing wife, Kahlan.  The Chainfire spell discovered in the previous book is still in effect, but Richard discovers that the spell form has been corrupted, as has all magic to some extent.  At the same time, Richard sees that the direct confrontation battles between the New World and the Old World are futile, since the Old World has supplies and troops far beyond those of the New World.  Richard orders his army to break into multiple, small armies, and sends them into the Old World to wreak havoc and destruction.  Meanwhile, Kahlan, having no memory of who she is, travels with the Sisters of the Dark to gather the items needed to cast an all-powerful magic that would give the Sisters immortality and unparalleled power.

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]

With the ninth book, Chainfire, the Sword of Truth series starts the final story arc, that will continue through the final two books to the conclusion of the series.

Chainfire is the beginning of a trilogy of books that completes the Sword of Truth series.  After a battle, Richard awakes to find Kahlan gone.  Even more disturbing is that nobody seems to remember who Kahlan is, or that Richard was ever married.  It is as if Kahlan has been erased from the world without ever having existed.  While desperately trying to convince the others that Kahlan is real, he tirelessly searches for her and for the enemies that have taken her, setting a dark plan into motion.

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]

Eighth in Terry Goodkind’s Sword of Truth series, Naked Empire brings the regular characters back to the forefront in their continuing efforts to defeat the Imperial Order.

Naked Empire picks up right where The Pillars of Creation leaves off.  ”The Gang”, as I’ll be referring to the group of heroes from here on out, encounters an individual named Owen, who begs for their assistance.  He gets The Gang’s assistance by poisoning Richard, with the promise of an antidote once he has freed Owen’s people from the Imperial Order.  Richard soon finds out that the Bandakar (Owen’s people) are all pristinely ungifted, with no spark of magic, like his half-sister Jennsen.  He reasons that the Imperial Order’s motives for conquering the Bandakar, as out of the way as they are, are to use them as a weapon against magic, as magic has no effect on them.  Richard must find a way to expel the Imperial Order from Bandakar, and win the allegiance of the Bandakar people before his time runs out.

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]

The Pillars of Creation, the seventh installment of the Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind, is the first in the series not to prominently feature the regular characters of the first six books.

In The Pillars of Creation, we are introduced to some new characters whose storylines will dominate most of the book.  Jennsen and Sebastian are first escaping the assassins of “Lord Rahl”, then joining Jagang and the Imperial Order, setting out to assassinate Richard Rahl.  Oba is discovering that he has a great deal of strength and power, and is seeking answers and riches.  Though neither knows it, Jennsen and Oba are half-siblings to each other, as well as to Richard Rahl.  It is discovered that Jennsen and Oba are known as “Pillars of Creation”, meaning that they have no spark of magical ability in them whatsoever.  This is a rarity in a world where almost every living being has at least a miniscule spark of magic within them.  This story sets up for the eighth book in the series, Naked Empire, which delves deeper into the world of the ungifted.

-[insert revolutionary thinking here]