The Ten Worst Photos Of Me Ever Taken

In a twisted sense, this post is the height of narcissism, but at the same time I dare my fellow blog authors to duplicate it.

As such, I present the ten worst photos of me ever taken (with commentary from KLS).

Before I start though, I have to issue a disclaimer. I do not own every photo ever taken of me, and I don’t doubt there are some out there that would make this list. I specifically refer to a legendary image of me in yellow shorts and a yellow t-shirt with yellow hair taken during a sports festival during high school, which is known to be in the possession of SMC…

In order to fully enjoy this list, I suggest you not skip ahead, for the images are listed in order of least-worst first:

10.jpg < #10 (1993) RS: "The glasses, the hair, the leather jacket. Nothing about this photo is at all cool. If I saw this person in real life, I'd hit him." KLS: "It's all about the glasses!" 9.jpg < #9 (1995) RS: "I just hate it. It makes my skin crawl..." KLS: "You just look like such a dipshit!" 8.jpg < #8 (1999) RS: "The earliest digital photo on this list. Why didn't I delete it?" KLS: "You look like a crackhead with allergies." 7.JPG < #7 (2002) RS: "Taken during a hair-dyeing procedure (we bleached it before dyeing it red). Just awful..." KLS: "I don't really have to say anything, do I?" 6.jpg < #6 (1993) RS: "The oldest photo on this list, taken just days after arriving from Australia. Is this even me? I can't believe I ever thought those glasses looked good..." KLS: (just laughs out loud) 5.JPG < #5 (2005?) RS: "A self-portrait gone horribly, horribly wrong..." KLS: "The frogman cometh!" 4.JPG < #4 (2007) RS: "I actually like this photo. It makes me look strong!" KLS: "You look scary, and like you have a terminal disease!" 3.jpg < #3 (1999) RS: "I plead the fifth on defining the caption. What 'bandanna phase'?" KLS: "You look like a fat professional wrestler!" 2.jpg < #2 (1996?) RS: "Not the worst, but hands down the most embarassing. It was a monumental effort to actually upload and post this diabolically awful image of the antithesis of cool.”
KLS: “It’s the total package!”

1_1.JPG 1_2.JPG < #1, 2006 RS: "The story behind this pair of images is this: I was out one morning removing snow for hours. I came in, showered and proceeded to shave off the full beard I had at the time. As a bit of a joke I kept the mustache, and KLS was smart enough to snap these two images. They have become somewhat iconic, specifically the leftmost one, as not just the worst photo ever of me, but the worst ever possible photo that could ever be taken of me! Note the ‘lobotomy scar’, the sunken eyes, the offensive mustache and the rash on my neck. This photo is so incomparably bad, that in a certain way it is just sublime.”
KLS: “It looks like a photo of a mustache with some dude hiding behind it!”

Enjoy this post while you can, because even now as I am about to hit ‘publish’ I am debating deleting it…

NYCC

On Saturday, April 19 we’re going to the New York Comic Con!

What will it be like? What can we expect? What will we see and do? What will we buy? (How will we get there?)

Answers to these questions and more will be posted on April 20th 🙂

Nintendo Baby

I apologize this post has been so long in coming, especially since I know everyone has been on the edge of their seats waiting for…the 2007 game collection year in review!

2007 saw me buy a total of 98 games, which is a 17% reduction from the previous year. Dollar totals increased though (by about 10%), mostly due to the purchase of the PS3 and PSP Slim. Discounting hardware, the average cost/game of about $20.50 was almost identical to the previous year. Here’s a chart summary of both totals:

totals.jpg

The above is a breakdown of games per system. Unsurprisingly, the DS is far in the lead. 2007 saw my DS game collection pass 120 games – this year will see it pass 138 (my GBA total) to become the system for which I have the most games. 2007 also saw the ‘retirement’ of the Gamecube, as I doubt I’ll ever buy another game for it. The one Gamecube game I bought in ’07 was Odama, the microphone-based pinball simulator (which I played for about an hour and put away…). One pleasant surprise in 2007 was the re-emergence of the PSP as a viable system. I was ready to write it off at the end of 2006, but the good games finally started coming and it had a good year. This will continue in ’08, which has already seen some stellar releases for the system (Patapon, Final Fantasy 7: Crisis Core, R-Type Tactics).

dollars.jpg

The dollar totals are above. Please don’t add them up and make rash judgements about my spending 🙂

Excluding gifts (which I value as zero in my database), the least expensive game I bought in 2007 was Piyotama, the download-only game from the Playstation store, which cost a mere $2.99. The least expensive packaged game was Quick Spot, a DS puzzle game bought brand new at a CompUSA closing sale for $4.98.

The most expensive game purchase (excluding hardware) of 2007 was World Of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Collector’s Edition which was purchased shortly after midnight on the day of release and cost $80 and nearly much more, since I fell on ice on the way back to the car and landed painfully on my wrist! The game on which I spent the most in 2007 was easily World Of Warcraft, since my account was active for 6 months (about $90) on top of the cost for the expansion.

The best game of the year, at least that I bought? That’s a tough call, and depends on what mood I am in. Contenders would certainly be World Of Warcraft (PC), Osu! Tatakae! Ouenden 2! (DS) or Monster Hunter Freedom 2 (PSP). I’ll leave you all to decide which one I enjoyed the most 🙂