For me it had to be when my 60 year old mother channeled her inner diva in Rock Band and belted out the vocals to a bunch of songs. Of course by "belting out" I mean "timidly muttered", but to her credit she sang several songs--of her own volition--without even knowing the words. At one point I looked around and realized I was playing a video game with my sister, girlfriend, and mom. It was surreal, hilarious, and great fun.

I should have formed a band right then and there: Kato's Angels.

Did you have any amusing holiday moments with friends, family, pets, or loved ones?

Snowbot wishes you a Merry Christmas. He also wants me to tell you that there are "many copies" and that they "have a plan", whatever that's supposed to mean.

Although I'm currently in the "Land that Broadband Forgot", I have one of these little dudes from ThinkGeek gracing guarding my desk at home and can assure you that he is awesome. Someone uploaded his awesomeness to YouTube for all to enjoy:



Here's hoping yours was a very Merry Christmas, where applicable.

come on and let it snow!

If you've ever seen the movie "Love Actually" you'll get the reference.

Christmas is tomorrow. Here's hoping Santa brings you what you asked for. Personally, all I want is to never hear that damn Mariah Carey song again. All you want for Christmas is me. I get it, already. Now quit stalking me, you're in every store I've walked into the past three weeks!

"O Holy Night" has never been performed with such disregard for tone or harmony than in the rendition presented here. As much as it may pain you, you simply must listen through to the end. It gets better (worse) as it goes. Unfathomable, but true.



To quote Norm Macdonald: "Happy Birthday, Jesus. I hope you like crap."

It's Winter again and I sound like an asbestos factory worker with a 4-pack-a-day habit.

Yes, that's right folks, Kato popped his out of his cubicle and saw his shadow which means six more weeks of mucus!

Joy of joys. From this point on you can just call me "Throaty McLozenge" (of the Ohio McLozenges, not the Boston McLozenges who are distant cousins). I already have enough gripes about the winter, might as well tack on a constant hacking cough to the mix. My lungs are like a canary in a coal mine, sensitive little buggers. Air too dry? Cough. Air too cold? Cough. Time to go to bed? Cough. Time to get up? Cough. Showering? Cough. Drown.

Fortunately the coughing usually stops after I've shredded the Hell out of my lung tissue by expelling air (and god knows what else) from them at velocities that I can only assume exceed several times the speed of sound. I am certain my coughing is accompanied by sonic booms, which makes me a minor superhero, I think, though that is only a slight comfort. When I've tired myself out I spend the rest of the time in a perpetual state of throat-clearing. You know, like "Hey, Bob, ahem, I was looking ahem over the test aheeeem results and ahem ahem I think we should ahem focus ahem our ahem efforts on aheeeeeeeeeem examining ahem the DNA ahem evidence [trails off into another minute of 'ahem' throat-clearing]"

Whatever. Maybe I'm exaggerating. Winter still sucks.

Hope you all aren't suffering like I am. Spring, don't forsake me!

MCLozenge out.

It must be the obsessive-compulsive side of my brain but I cringe every time I see a song come up in iTunes that doesn't, for whatever reason, have album art. Something about that blank music note "no art" graphic stabs at my brain like a pick into squishy, gray-matter ice. For most albums this isn't a problem, but I've come across quite a few songs that just don't appear in the iTunes catalog for one reason or another. I spent literally an entire evening one night updating the artwork for all the little dinky b-side and uncommon tracks sitting on my hard drive so that I wouldn't have to see that little pair of notes in Cover Flow. (Damn that "Classic Hammond Organ Hits" compilation!)

Thank the Gods of Kobol for Google Image Search.

Burger King has free wi-fi access. Who knew?

What happened to The Whopper? I used to love it but they just don't make it like they used to. Maybe they need to bring back the pure animal fat grease and non-biodegradeable wrappers to seal in the flavor.

My girlfriend, inexplicably, actually enjoys playing videogames with me.

Pinch me.

This is convenient as I sometimes crave them like a pregnant woman craves pickles and ice cream. Plus, it's nice to finally hang out with a woman who doesn't roll her eyes or look dumbfounded when I proudly exclaim that I've found a way to take super awesome 3D screenshots in Halo 3.

One night we were playing said game online, in either a doubles or a team match. We lost and she didn't have a particularly great round, only scoring a few points. One of our sore-winner opponents (and there are plenty of them on Xbox Live--apparently you can't earn achievements in "Sportmanship") decided he would reveal how big of an asshat he really was by taunting her.

"You suck balls," he said in the post-game lobby.

My girlfriend, quick of wit and unfased by the base and rather unoriginal insult, replied with this gem:

"Oh yea? Well, I'm a girl, so at least I have an excuse. You're a guy, so when you do it, it just makes you gay."

The corner of my mouth turn up into a half-smile. I suspected the simpleton on the other end of the voice chat wouldn't be bright enough to comprehend what she just did there. His silence seemed to confirm my suspicions.

Then I realized her mic was muted.

Oh well, at least I heard it. I congratulated her on her comeback and proceeded to give Asshat McGee some tasty bad feedback on Live. Don't be a dick to my girlfriend, dude, unless you want to be punished and face a verbal lashing.

As a footnote, when I'm playing by myself online and someone decides to taunt me, she will sit next to me on the couch and mock them. In a match where I managed to squeak out a victory with a fantastic last-minute comeback, the second place player made some whiny, disparaging comment to me.

Her response? "It's a shame he'll never get a blowjob."

Zing!

Ugh, Red Ring of Death for the second time. I expect to receive one of these in the mail any day now.



Guess this is my excuse to go buy an Elite.