A Cappella Crossword

Playlists

I've added my two YouTube playlists over on the center-right panel under the "about" page. Check them out because they're freakin' brilliant.

Here's the latest:

Happy Saturday! Here's Some Kermit!

More Hitman Stuff

I'm in the eye of the hurricane right now, having just turned in a final paper this afternoon and awaiting the flood of student papers and flurry of grading that will begin Friday. I haven't had much blog time, but I rarely do any serious work after about 6:00, so that's when I usually make game videos. Lately I've been piggybacking on Orlando by making YouTube responses to his awesome Hitman walkthroughs, which has been a pleasant diversion. Here are two of the videos I've made in the last two days. They are nowhere near as long as the first one, so I'm not asking you to sit through twenty minutes of me messing around.

Description of the first:

Agent 47 blew off one of his toes while cleaning his Silverballers, so the Agency recruited Steve. He did his job well enough, but we think he's seen The Godfather too many times.

Steve the Michael Corleone Wannabe - The Seafood Massacre from Gene on Vimeo.

Description of the second:

Agent 47 had a contract to take out a 400 pound opera singer. When he garotted her, she fell backwards and broke three of his ribs, so we had to find yet another replacement.

Zeke seemed like a good candidate: very professional, a bit on the quiet side and proficient with firearms.

The ensuing chaos was totally unexpected. When we asked Zeke why he did what he did, he said, "All sinners shall burn. I am an agent of the Lord." The name should have been a tip-off. He is now at the bottom of a lake, as per Agency orders.

Ezekiel the Fanatic - The Meat King's Party from Gene on Vimeo.

What can I say? I love these games, whether playing in stealth mode or psychotic freak mode. Once I figure out how to do a mission in stealth, I usually revert to psycho-killer. It must be an unbridled id thing.

YouTube Is a Cesspool Part Deux

Just to irritate my YouTube troll, I decided to upload another video of a Road Rage event in Burnout with a French soundtrack, this time using La Chanson de Jacky by Jacques Brel. It's not perfect. The music doesn't sound very good because I was using a video editor with which I'm still a bit unfamiliar, but I made the video in about a half hour, so everything pretty much worked out.

The next morning, I had already received a one-star rating. I really can't tell if it's the same fellow, but I'm guessing it is. I do have one fan in Romania who gave the original video five stars and subscribed to the channel, though, and when I had to delete the first video (thereby losing his rating and comment) I asked him to do me a favor and re-rate it. Well, he did me one better by leaving this comment:

Sure M8. And if he does not understand what you try to accomplish with the music, he is an uncultured swine.

The English is slightly broken, but I think we would all have to admit that it's better than that of the American who left the earlier comment. Also, I love the phrase "uncultured swine." We Americans don't use phrases like that nearly enough. Anyway, here is the latest Burnout video, warts and all.

La Chanson du Burnout Paradise from Gene on Vimeo.

YouTube Is a Cesspool

I cross-post my videos at YouTube and Vimeo. I use YouTube because it attracts more hits, but I embed the videos using Vimeo's player because it seems to fit the site's theme better. Last night I had to replace my original Burnout video so that the right URL appeared in the title screen. Vimeo has a handy function where one can simply replace an existing video, but with YouTube the original video must be deleted entirely and uploaded again. No big deal.

Well, this morning I checked my email and found that someone had commented on the original YouTube video before I had deleted it. Unfortunately the comment is now lost, but the commenter did take the time to give the video a one-star rating. I really don't mind that, but he also left a rather interesting message on my channel. I won't give away the profile name, but this is the comment I received:

dumbass dumbass dumbass dumbass dumbass dumbass bastard bastard an once agian this is america you son of a bitch !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm assuming that the genius in question objected to my using music in (gasp!) French as a soundtrack to the video, which is all well and good. I'm no big fan of France myself, though I have nothing against the French as a people (so keep your shirts on, folks.) As to the rest of the comment, I think that it is a bit redundant to call someone a "dumbass" six times and a "bastard" twice. I don't mind being called a dumbass, since it may very well be true, but I know for a fact that I am not a bastard since I was born within wedlock.

I won't bother to comment on the grammar or the spelling. They speak for themselves, or rather they speak for the commenter. How patriotic can one possibly be if one cannot even capitalize the name of his own country? Finally, as for me being a "son of a bitch," my mother and I get along quite well, though other people might have differing opinions. Perhaps this fellow ran into her at some point and the two had an altercation.

Anyway, my next video on YouTube will no probably feature both Burnout and French music. There's no such thing as bad publicity.