I have no idea why I'm blogging about this. It's rare that I go for the personal stuff, and having two such articles back to back strikes me as more than a little odd. But nonetheless, here I go.

About once every six or eight months, I have a dream about a girl I keep convincing myself I've forgotten about. After the dream, I spend the next few days trying to ignore the swell of various emotions that I find popping up inside of me. They range from a bizarre peace twinged with sadness, to a kind of arrogant and fruitless denial that any of that crap still phases me after so many years.

I also have to convince myself that it really doesn't mean anything at all. The dream isn't some kind of heads up for the future. She is not coming back to see me, not coming back at all. There's no hidden meaning here, other than this: I should stop eating beef stew poured over rice just before bed time.

Ah well, what can you do? Blog about it, I guess; the modern reaction to any and all things human. Dish it out to relative strangers so they can comment and cajole. I'm just not sure what thought makes me more upset: the thought that the dreams might continue even though I will never see her again, or the thought that they might stop someday.

It was just one of those things. I could have done better, could have been less needy, less self-absorbed, more of....well, in my 29 years on the earth I am still trying to figure out what word or phrase goes after "more of." But I am happy to say that my former co-dependence is pretty well dead, something that I'm sure will help me in the long run.

Anyway, I suppose I'll leave you with this. The title alone fits, but the content of the song itself is all too perfect. Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTvm7Dt6Tw8&feature=related

P.S. I'm not really expecting comments here. If you can think of something to say, kudos. Mostly though, I just wanted to get it off my chest.

This blog serves a number of different purposes. In a round about way, it is a response to Laughlyn12's most recent editorial. It is an explanation of my own personal beliefs. But more important than that, it's an open apology to those who have been scorned by the group mentioned below.

And this is not my attempt to convert anyone to my way of thinking. It is simply how I think. Seeing as how this topic is one that is very close to my heart, it promises to be text heavy. It may even become a series, as I see this issue to be one that merits a prolonged and serious discussion.

Let's get started.

I am a Christian. I believe in Christ, I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in redemption. I believe in good and evil, the whole nine. This is something that very few of you know about me. It's not something I openly discuss, and just the fact that I find myself typing these words has me feeling very uncomfortable. Why uncomfortable? Well, number one, it's because the internet is not the place for evangelical practices.

I believe that I would be doing each of you a great disservice by attempting to debate or convert on so impersonal a medium. The bulk of what I believe revolves around intimacy and relationship, and not around judgment fired from the hip at total strangers. And so I refrain from the topic as much as I can.

More importantly though, I am uncomfortable discussing this belief because of a well-deserved stigma placed upon the Christian community. A stigma that revolves around a good number of them being self-righteous butt holes.

So let me tell you something else that I believe in: I believe that Christians, not all but enough, have completely lost sight of what their center is supposed to be. You see, the Gospel is supposed to be simple. And what it has become is a ridiculous representation of what it is intended to be. It has become a farce, a cruel mockery of the truth.

Let me tell you what its not supposed to be. It's not supposed to be about forcing your beliefs on someone else, about making "friends" with them just so you can convert them, beating people over the head with scripture, or casually telling people that they are bad people and that they are going to burn in hell.

All in all, it's supposed to be about love. Its supposed to be about helping people endure, about helping people overcome. Its supposed to be one person looking at another, and in spite of their failings or flaws, loving them just the same. NOT BECAUSE IT EARNS YOU POINTS WITH GOD, BUT BECAUSE THEY ARE PEOPLE TOO. It's about killing judgment, and understanding that each of us is in the same state.

But what it has become is obscene. It has become what I call "The Bumper Sticker Gospel." I'm sure many of you have seen these stickers crowding the bumpers of cars across the nation. "Christians are not perfect, they're just forgiven." As a Christian, I find these to be insulting. I cannot imagine how infuriating it must be to the uninitiated. Why not just make a sticker that reads "I'm a Christian, so God loves me more," or "God thinks I'm better than you are."

And more frustrating than what it states is what it represents. It is proof positive that Christians are all too willing to bash people over the head with their beliefs, to assume a defensive pose against the world. Instead of simply loving them, they would rather snipe at them from a safe distance than get involved with their lives and help them. Quite frankly, I am sick to death of the "holy headshot."

It has become drive-by evangelism; a group of pig headed and self-righteous people who attack anyone who refuses to believe what they believe. Steeped in judgment and condemnation, It has become the exact opposite of what Christ intended. In fact, it has become the exact opposite of Christ himself.

Rather than love people, we rally the troops against "queers and pagans and whores." We form picket lines and boycott certain groups of people. With no interest at all in what struggles they may be having in their lives, we label them like so much soup; boil them down to whatever surface flaw we may see, all the while refusing to acknowledge our own flaws and inconsistency.

And don't misunderstand: helping people is not supposed to come from an attitude of superiority. It's supposed to come from a heart that just wants to see people do better, a heart that understands that a lot of life's problems can be solved simply by knowing that some one else gives a crap about how your day went.

What I find interesting about the entire issue is the simple fact that the very character of Christ is the exact opposite of what I see from Christians today. Let's take a look at the company Christ kept: whores, thieves, lepers, adulterers, murderers, and tax-collectors (which sounds amusing until you understand what it meant to be a tax-collector back in the day).

And he didn't just keep company with them: he broke bread with them. The act of dining with someone back then was a huge deal. It was statement of trust, of intimacy, of involvement and the promise of continued involvement in a person's life. Christ was not disgusted with the pariahs of his day. He embraced them. And embraced them knowing full well what it would do to his reputation.

You know who he did avoid? You know who Jesus couldn't stand? Who he scorned? The self-righteous and the religious. The finger pointers, the rule makers, the members of the picket line. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. He had zero tolerance for the religious "elite."

I've often said that the reason that more people aren't interested in church is because Jesus' PR team sucks noodles. Why go to church, after all, when you can be judged anywhere else in life? And you don't have to endure some long-winded sermon to receive that judgement. You just have to leave your house.

So, on behalf of Christians everywhere, I just wanted to apologize to those of who have encountered this kind of hatred from a people that claim their lives have been transformed by love. It's obscene, damaging, hurtful. The only thing I can say is that we're not all like that, and I'm sorry for those that are.

For those of you who commented on my last blog, my thanks. Please just know that I intended the entire thing to be a joke. I figured people would try to look up the website, notice that it didn't exist, and then call me dirty names. The whole thing was a work of fiction. The site doesn't exist, and I suppose that L33t will be my alter-ego from here on out. Moving on.

Surprise surprise! Prototype, the sandbox style blood-bath brought to us by the questionable developers behind Scarface, has been pushed back to 2009. Don't believe me? Prototype pushed to 2009

Now, as of this posting, it is listed as having a Q3 2008 release date, a fact that will most likely change with this new development.

Now, the common statement that follows this is "the developers just need more time to pollish things." And while this may be true to a certain extent, I think there is something else entirely different going on.

So here's my theory. I think that developers intentionally mislead the gaming public in regards to release dates so that they can get free advertising from game sites and mags. The rationale being, the closer we come to a game's release, the more frenzied sites and mags become about getting those "exclusive" pics, interviews, etc. They are therefore more likely to plaster the site or mag with said images, in an attempt to scoop the competition.

What this creates, is perpetual motion in the form of a free-ad machine. You get right up to the cusp of the release date, and then you push it back. Pretty smart, if you ask me.

Personally, I don't think this is a bad practice. It doesn't hurt anyone, after all (unless you count those rabid fans who pull their cat's hair out when they don't get the game when they want it), so if you can dupe someone into promoting your product for free, and can keep them following the proverbial carrot-on-a-stick for eternity, then why the hell not?More screenshots, etc means more pageviews for the site, so everybody wins.

I guess the fans miss out to a certain extent, but who really gives a crap anyway? If you're like me, you still have a stack of unfinished PS2 games waiting on you, so a little delay will give us time to get through the games we've forgotten about.

Just don't be surprised the next time you hear about some game you've been waiting for being pushed back. If it says Q3 or Winter 08, or anything other than a firm day of a firm month, more than likely its going to be pushed back.

The developers just want to keep it in your head for as long as they can before they finally let it loose.

The following is something I discovered cruising the net. I thought it might be interesting to let everybody see what's going on beyond the confines of this site. The original post, in all of its disturbing glory, can be found on a site called "boobsandnoobs.com"

MY REEVIEWE OF "THE GREET GATSBY" by L33tN00BSPANKER653

Sup guys!?! My teach Ms. Dingle made me play this game that is tehsuxor, and then made me write a reevieiew on its. I was like "Is that a books?" And she was like "Just think of it as a proton (after much thought, I decided the author was going for "prototype" here)for video games." And I was like "Whatever lady." And she was like "Wahtever, L33t."

So hear I goes: my reeviewe of "Teh Greety Gatsbys" by some dude named Fitzgeeralds.

Story------

Um, lame? That';s all this games is being. One big stiry. One big lame stiry. Bunch a rich dudes and this one poor dude who handz outs with them. Weird, but still the lameness. Epic Fail!

Gameplay-------

It works. Nothing special. You finish a page, you turn to another. Repeat like 250 times. Again, lameness.

Sound-------

Soooooooooooooo quiet. The suxor factor is strong with this ones. Epic fail.

Graphics-------

NONE!! DID YOU HERE THATZ? NO GRAPHIC AT ALL!!! Why I be hear, sittings hear, playing this game with no graphics? Its like one of those old "Text adventure" thingys I heard about from my Dad. My Dad is a total noob by the wya. I totally pwned him on evrything ive evr played.

The Endza:

2.5 OUT OF 10!!!!!!!! This game is the ultimate SUXOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HALO RULZ!!!!!!!!!!!!

For the sake of my readers, I had to end the article there. The words "HALO RULZ" were followed by a series of four-letter words, none of which were censored by the original site.

For the big 5-0, I wanted to do something special. Well, nothing says "special" like subjecting your friends to special forms of internet based torture. I feel like I need to share this, so that maybe it will never happen again. Be warned, this video is not for the squeamish.

http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=I%20Want%20My%20PS3&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GGLG&um=1&sa=N&tab=wv

Please note, this blog comes out right on the heels of one I did about an hour ago. The previous blog was a really crappy attempt at humor on my part. For the few of you who read it, my condolences. The whole point of this blog, however, is a little more serious in nature. It is simply meant to start a discussion. I'm just going to ask a couple of questions, and then take my hands off the wheel. It stems purely from my own curiosity, and is in no way meant to try and change anything. Nor is it meant to convey my opinion about these matters. I would much rather hear yours.

As a buddy of mine pointed out, GTA 4 is the first game in seven years to receive a "10." The last one to receive it was Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 (PS2) way back when. Now, given the number of superb games that have come out between then and now, I must say a couple of questions have popped into my head.

1. Is Gamespot too harsh in their reviews? That is to say, do they take this hobby so seriously they want to approach every review with an objective, almost hyper-critical air, or have they just forgotten that games are supposed to be about having fun first, and all of that technical stuff second?

2.Are the reviews more about promoting the merits of the game, or are they more about promoting the merits of the site?

3. Do you, the audience, find it refreshing that a site such as this doesn't give out 10s easily, or do you feel that by being stingy with such scores, GS comes off as a little snobbish?

4. How do you define a 10? Is it in terms of "a game without blemish," or in terms of "a game that stands head and shoulders above the rest?"

Now, as I have said, I have my own answers to these questions (and if you'll notice I haven't displayed them here) . What I want is to hear yours. What are your thoughts on the above? What are your thoughts on the GTA hype thus far?

As always, thanks for reading.