VS.

I got a comment from a friend of mine about how Punchy creeps her out, and it made me think that it might be time to have a showdown: Kool-Aid Man vs. Punchy.

Once and for all, it’s time to decide who’s got the better juice.

PRO

Kool-Aid Man

Punchy

• Has multiple flavors of juice
• Juice packets are inexpensive
• Can break though walls, doors, etc.
• Catch phrase: “Oh Yeah!”
• High percentage of name / face recognition

• Can help you dye your hair / clothes / housepets

• Keen hat
• Knows how to surf
• Juice comes premade
• Juice is good mixer with rum
• Juice doesn’t separate
• Catchy name: “Punchy”
• Best red juice on the market
• Juice sometimes in 7-11 Big Gulp dispenser

CON

Kool-Aid Man

Punchy

• Too fat to ride in car
• Spills liquid everywhere he goes
• Always sweating
• Liar - holds real fruit in his hand when he should be holding powder packets
• High level of personal property destruction in his wake
• Juice requires “mixing” and separates if you leave it sitting too long

• Stupid, generic name: “Kool-Aid Man”

• Low level of name / face recognition
• Only one flavor of juice (the best flavor, though)
• Short - only other job he could do would be work on Fantasy Island looking for De Plane
• Juice only comes in 64 oz. containers; should come in 5 gallon buckets
• No catch phrase (“Wouldn’t you like a Hawaiian Punch?” doesn’t count)

You would think that looks pretty even, but if you closely analyze the pros and cons, you’ll see that THE WINNER IS PUNCHY. With his never-beaten red juice, keen hat, and Big Gulp opportunities, it’s not hard to see why. Maybe next time, Kool-Aid Man.

I’ve been living up the Amplitude, and I’m finding that the more I play, the better I get (as you would hope but not necessarily expect). It being a musical game and me with [what I would like to think is] a decent sense of rhythm, the only real thing you have to figure out is how to get your fingers to move in the appropriate pattern.

Jenn was watching me last night as I was going through a pretty complex set of tracks and was saying that she didn’t think her brain could work that fast. That’s when I realized the key to the game: You can’t think about what you’re doing, you just have to do it. If you take the time to analyze and cogitate the pattern, you’ve already taken too long and you’re done. I guess it’s sort of like any other inherent sort of talent, kind of like riding a bike - you don’t think, “Okay, now I balance this way, now I step on this pedal…” You just ride the bike. I think that’s one of the things I like best about the game - no analysis, just raw action.

I decided, since I’ve fought enough with SharePoint Portal Server 2003 today to last three lifetimes, that, in the immortal words of McDonald’s, “I deserve a break today.” Though not necessarily in the implied proverbial “McDonald’s Way.” Instead, I went to the cafeteria and got myself a pepperoni and garlic pizza, a favorite among my colleagues in the department.

Jenn and I watched a movie last night, Holes. It’s a family movie, but it was surprisingly well done and I didn’t feel cheated out of my time like I usually do with family films. The character played by Jon Voight reminded me very much of my grandfather, which was a little scary.

I got notification today from Microsoft that I’m officially a Microsoft Certified Application Developer in .NET, and I should be getting my certificate (suitable for framing) in the mail shortly. That’s cool; it signifies that I’m making progress, which I like.

I think Jenn and I will be going boating this weekend with some friends of ours that we haven’t seen for a long time. It’ll be good to get out, and even better to see them again. Fun stuff.

While cruising around, I found this site called JList that carries all sorts of Japanese contraband of dubious nature. They’ve got some Domokun stuff on there, which is cool but expensive, as well as some… interesting “photobooks,” as they call them. Heh.

I’ve figured out that there’s something odd with the way the SSL is working with my webmail access, so accessing without the SSL has let me into my 147 messages. Actually, much less than I expected, but most of them are spam, which was exactly as I expected.