Stuff Trans Like

For all you Tran lovers out there (and let’s face it, there’s a lot of you out there), without further ado, the latest edition of Stuff Trans Like…

• Calamari - First made popular to the Trans by the Muay Thai trained middle Tran, this dish of fried breaded squid has become a staple appetizer for us whenever we are out dining. We especially like versions with peppers. MMMmmmm good

• Gilmore Girls – Probably one of our favorite shows ofthe early 2000’s. And to think that we almost didn’t watch this show because I wanted to eat my chicken wings and watch Friends. Thank goodness, the Lord Jeffian Tran convinced me otherwise. She’s persuasive that way. Anyway, spending Tuesday nights with Lorelai and Lorelai (Rory) Gilmore was something we always looked forward to…well, except for maybe the last season or two. Plus those ladies were hawt.

• Barack Obama – We are young, college-educated, and AZN. Okay, so maybe that last part isn’t typical of Obama’s base, but man do we love that guy. Hillary Clinton can’t handle our O face.

• Alex MacCloud – What’s less than 5 feet tall, weighs over 100 lbs, and is a level 50 in World of Warcraft? It’s this butterball 3rd grader who may have been one of funniest and most charming kids we have ever known. Whether it be telling me that my “hair smells like garbage,” or wrestling the Muay Thai Tran to the floor, this kid is hilarious.

• Aluminum foil – Simply the best. Great for making pizza rolls. Great for lining baking trays when making chicken wings. Great for minimizing messes. How they managed to turn metal into paper, I’ll never know. But yeah, we use it. a lot.

Koala Gaming Diary – May 7, 2008

If you have a PS2, like brawling, and are looking for an engrossing story involving the Japanese mafia, then Yakuza is the game for you. I really liked this game a lot. I’ve never been to Tokyo, but I hear it does a great job depicting is nightlife district. Total playtime was around 12 hours or so, many of these minutes spent joyfully beating up nameless Yakuza. Plus, the lead character Kazuma has a very cool dragon tattoo on his back (see photo to the right).

On a different note, my Xbox 360 has been repaired and according to UPS is now residing in the ether between Texas and Connecticut. About time, I say. I’ve been dying to play GTA, Dead Rising, and Army of Two, and not to mention rocking out to new songs on Rock Band.

Also, have received a couple of more games from Goozex, including God of War (yet another game from my pile of shame) and…what?….what’s this?…looks like Uncharted, which will be my very first PS3 game. If it goes well, I might consider firing up my PS3 for things other than watching Blu-ray, playing Divx, or as a PS2 machine.

Up next: God of War. Time to battle the gods and apparently….a sex mini-game?!?

Koala Gaming Diary – April 29, 2008

Ok, folks been super super busy. A lot has happened in the two weeks since my last post. First and foremost, my Elite 360 got the dreaded red ring of death! (oh knowz!) Except it wasn’t the three red lights…I got one red light and the error message E74. A quick google search indicated that this was likely to be an error in one of the graphics components, so needless to say, my console was f’d. Luckily I was still under warranty, so Micro$oft sent me my coffin and now I’m just waiting for it to get shipped back.

However, this really messed up some of my gaming plans. I had just gotten Army of Two and was ready to bust some fictional Middle-eastern country to hell with my brother online. I also got a copy of Dead Rising from Goozex and was ready to pretend I was in Dawn of the Dead. And perhaps most frustrating, I got a nice clean copy of Grand Theft Auto IV sitting on my tv stand just begging to be taken for a spin. Alas, all for naught. Why oh why have you forsaken me oh gaming gods!

Koala Game Diary – April 15, 2008

Sorry for the delay between posts folks. Have been extremely busy gaming and working in the hospital. Plus, the weather is starting to get nice outside, so I’ve been venturing outside and seeing this long dormant object called the sun. Anyway, onto my gaming updates.

• Professor Layton – Proving that my brain is working well (despite what my wife may have you believe), I conquered this awesome game and its 100+ puzzles. My favorite puzzle involved transporting people back and forth between an island and a sinking ship. My least favorite was the one involving counting triangles. All you who have played the game know what I am talking about. If you got a DS and want to work on puzzles that really train your brain and test logic, definitely get this game.

Koala Game Diary – April 2, 2008

1) Been playing a ton of Lost Odyssey recently.  Currently on the 4th disc, working on the sidequests prior to going back to Numara aboard the Nautilus.  About 37 hours into it, and have been playing an hour or so a night for the last few days.  Very similar to Final Fantasy, but seeing as how FFXIII probably won’t be out till late 2009, it’s the closest to a solid J-RPG this year.

Koala Game Diary – March 27, 2008

Hey folks! This is the inaugural post of a recurrent feature here at Chewing the Eucalyptus. I’ll be periodically posting the goings on of my gaming life. But first some background: I’ve been an avid gamer since as far back as I can remember.

My very first system was the old classic NES that my parents got me as a gift at much cajoling. I can still remember rolling on the floor shooting ducks and trying to figure out how to use the R.O.B. that came with the game.

Tran-style

My cousin in D.C. recently sent out a hilarious link to a fellow wordpress.com blogsite Stuff White People Like. I particularly like #11 Asian Girls because this perfectly describes one of my college buddies, and #40 Apple Products because let’s be honest, when’s the last time you saw anybdy but a white person using a Macs FACT! For example, do you know any Azns that use macs? They are far too busy building from scratch the biggest, fastest, PC to play World of Warcraft and torrent anime. Anyways, ideas started percolating in my brain and after a weekend of hanging out with my bad-@ss MMA-fighting younger brother and my Lord Jeff-ian baby sister, check out the flow below.

Koala’s Movie Corner – Enchanted, Atonement

Recently checked out two pretty different movies that arrived in my mailbox via the magic of Netflix.

Enchanted - Loved it. Cute, funny, and disarmingly entertaining for 100 minutes. Whether it be a 21st century New York vermin-featuring homage to the working songs of Snow White and Cinderella, or a role reversal of the “white knight” being rescued by his damsel, I really enjoyed the send-ups and shout-outs to many of the old Disney classics that fill this movie to bursting. I thought Amy Adams was terrific in it. She’s come a long from hanging with Jim Halpert and planning on being Lost with Legally Blonde or the Bridges of Madison County. She took a role that could easily have devolved into a cheesy mess and injected it with believability and warmth. I could easily see her as one of the nominees for Best Actress. After all, you can only have so much of women playing ugly (see Charlize Theron), playing men (see Hilary Swank, Felicity Huffman), or being old (see Judi Dench, etc). Overall, I rate this movie 5 out of 5 eucalyptus leaves. Buy it on Blu-Ray, watch it, love it.

The most famous area code of the 90’s.

So I was doing my normal perusing of entertainment news site, when I came across this link.

Needless to say, I was taken aback! They’re bringing back 90210?!? This is a show that I watched the f out of back in the early and mid 90’s. Who can forget classics like Donna Martin Graduates…Brandon gets drunk and crashes his car…You need an egg to get into a rave…Emily Valentine is an arsonist…Dylan gets an intervention…McSteamy’s real life wife gets shot and by her own dad’s hitmen!…and of course, the eternal question that continually plagued Dylan: Brenda or Kelly?

The raven-haired transplant from Minnesota or the leggy California blonde. Wow, tough choice. It’s hard to go wrong with either one. I mean, it’s not like this is Andrea we are talking about. No one wants her except for that half bartender/half lawyer Latin guy. After much soul searching and a quick google image search, winning in a landslide is the one and only Kelly Taylor.

Videogame Character Part II

The character Koala chose seems to be pretty good. The guy has it all. BUT….The only problem is that Koala created him. Therefore, it’s easy to like the guy that you created. Kinda like cheating in a way J. Plus none of the readers can identify with this character as they are not familiar with him.

So I’m going to add my take on this age old question of “which character I would like to be”. First off, I had to think of the main criteria of the guy. Here’s a few of them:

- Badass

- Fighting ability

- Chicks

- Appearance

- The game has to be good

Cloud from FFVII was one of the first that came to mind. But he can be a little effeminate and too much of a pretty boy sometimes. Link is boring and looks like a pansy. The elf wears green tights?!?! I eliminated Master Chief and anyone else who uses guns cause I don’t like guns. Ultimately, I went with the lead character from one of my favorite games, Star Wars KOTOR…….Darth Revan

Badass? He’s the most powerful Jedi/Sith . Fighting Ability? He uses lightsabers and Force Powers! Chicks? He’s got a hot Jedi girl named Bastila. Appearance? Check the picture below. And finally, Star Wars KOTOR is a great game.

Now technically, he’s an evil character in the beginning, and then you play through it, choosing whether or not he becomes good in the end (Note: I made him evil). But either way, it doesn’t really matter. Darth Revan is the baddest man in videogames.