Pickup Mission 2: Package Smackage!

Today was another pickup mission! Another one of the students doing their MS in SIUE (where my bro studies) had come to Hyderabad just the other day, and guess what? My brother sent things via her! Yeah, that's pretty common anyways, people send things for their parents/relatives back in India via friends leaving to India! So what were those things? Where was the pickup point? Read on!

Oh yeah, that's "Reeft Punk" btw.. my avatar when I ride on the bike :P The helmet with no Visor gives the cool, winged helmet feel to it, and the shades block the dust completely (there is a LOT of dust in HYD, eyes get destroyed). Oh and always have my iPod on whenever riding :D

*The Destination!

The destination was also quite far away this time! (it's like a mandatory condition that the friend's house should be really far away) Luckily it was not as far away as the previous one, and this time it was on the opposite side of the city. The complete path is on the Highway!! That's the best part of it, finally got a chance to ride on the Highway (for a long distance) Enjoyed the ride a lot I must say.. but don't get too joyful! Things can get really dangerous. Good thing it was not very deep into the highway, else ultra super fast trucks would have started zooming by.

The house I had to go to was in Chanda Nagar and there were many other nagars inside ChandaNagar, it was a confusing mess! I was going on a straight path and then it split into three. Let's just say that I roamed 3Kms ("gullies" and all), for 15 minutes of every path. AND the last one was the right place :| Ofcourse, it always has to be the last place! (stupid Murphy and his law)

*The Package!

So I finally reached the house, (ofcourse with a lot of assist over the phone from Pratibha didi :P ) and there I was greeted to THIS chunk of awesomeness! Just look at towering package! I put everything into my bag, and also gave the things that I prepared for my brother.. made a complete DVD (along with labels and Covers) Took me around 3 months to edit the 3hr + Video (along with handpicked BGM etc :D ) And another DVD with all the pictures taken when he was not here. I also gave the 1 GB DDr ram that I had lying around here, with no use at all.

Then Sat there for a while talked a bit with Pratibha didi, got to know a few things about how they all saw my bro :P After talking for about an hour or so (and after eating 2 Ferrero Rochers! ) I started the return journey. It's getting dark very soon now a days, was pretty dark by 6PM itself! Reached home in under an hour and was ready to...

*Layeth the SmakethDown!

I guess I already told you all about how my brother is a deal finder and always tries to get things for... not the standard price :P Lemme write down the things with their price and how he got them for that much! Ok, without further ado, here are the things!

As you can see.. There are 4 PS3 games

• LittleBigPlanet - $39 (Amazon Coupons)
• Resistance 2 Collector's Edition - $59 (Offer in Amazon)
• Heavenly Sword - $19 (Amazon again :P )
• UT III - $19 ( $21 with tax, Walmart )

And then there are two BD Movies too!

• Hulk Limited Edition - $16
• TDK 2-Disc Special Edition - $10

Both from Columbia house, don't ask me HOW though :P

What? You thought that was all ? Now have a look here!

The first 3 games are from the buy 2 get 1 free GameStop offer that was up not too long ago. And remaining are form Amazon :D

• Pikmin 1 - $24.99
• Pikmin 2 - $39.99
• LoZ: TP - $44.99
• No More Heroes - $14.99
• Wario Land : Shake it - $29.95
• Mercury Meltdown : Revolutions - $9.95

Yeah! That's 5 Wii/GC games in there! Can't wait to start playing them all, hehe.. just need Luigi's Mansion, SMS, and Eternal Darkness now :P

Here is a panoramic shot of everything in one pic! (two pics stitched together)

Huh? It seems Mr.Ephelant seems to have found something.. what's that? AppleSeed : DuesEx Machina DVD and PURE for PC! (for JUST $5! )

So that's it for this pickup mission! Sure was exhausting! Came home, took pics and then posted the blogs, that's all what I did this day.. now off to sleep!

As a Special gift here is another nice shot of the whole of the whole package!

Check out the Full Album for more pics!

Package Smackage

Wii Music Impressions and Video!

So, I've finally got my hands on the Wii today, but I was not the first one to get their "hands on" it. I made my mom have the honour of being the first to play the game, with me and dad watching as she played.

The game started with no menu's, it had the tutor appear, and teach the basic 4 styles of operating the instruments in the game. My mom did all the tutorials and then played her first song! The rhythm of "twinkle twinkle" is well known to my mom (she is the one who taught me that afterall :P ) She did pretty good in her first ever try at playing instruments using the wii mote (she used to play real instruments back in her days). How did it go? well here is a Video :D



After that..mom and dad, went on playing for hours and ha real fun making music and seeing their music being played on the BG when they were playing the different instruments. (your previous plays add to the whole arrangement, automatically) soon they had done a whole 2x3 person band music of DoReMe (another one my mom and dad know, thanks to "The Sound of Music" ) well, it was good but not... how do I say this... video worthy :P However the amount of happiness and joy my parents had , was more than worth it to give it a 100 popularity points :P

Later I sat and experimented with a few things, wanted to see if I could do some custom changes to songs I know. I acutally wanted to play the SMB 1-1 song.. so to unlock it went on playing, soon I unlocked 47 songs but SMB song was no where to be found :(

One thing Wii Music really helped me in was, knowing the names of all those songs that I liked but never knew the names of. You know, the songs that came in Tom and jerry cartoons and some other merry melodies or Silly symphonies.

Here is a video of me doing that song which comes in that Tom and Jerry episode, you know, the one where nibbler sings the Ferero Rocher song :P



Here is another video of me playing a song that's OUT of this WORLD, and I think I heard this in another Tom and jerry episode :P I used this instrument I like very much, whose name I never knew till I played the game, and also dont know now, only remember that it starts with a "D" hehe.



You wont know the difference unless you've heard the original, tell me how it was :P I know I am no expert and it was just my first try, wanted to see how the whole thing goes.

Cant wait to sit and record some videos of me playing with some beat boxer or maybe doo wopper, but, I want my SMB 1-1 theme! Played for 5h:47m today and it was awesome, unlocked 47 songs, SMB 1-1 not included, played only 4 songs till now though :P

P.S : Btw, you have to hand it to the guys who do the Wii game musics, I mean, everyone of those Menu Musics are so soothing and relaxing, they are some of the best musics I have heard in recent times, the one that comes when you save a video is just too good, there are many in other Wii branded games too, and ofcource SMG also has some good music.

A Pickup Mission and Feorgotting

Today was Eid, (Happy Eid to all! :D) Hence a holiday. So I decided I make most of this time and went to my brother's friend's house where he sent things that he bought in US. And these are just not normal purchases, everything was a special Deal...

*Point A to B

The journey was 60KM long and as usual I travelled via my lovely bike. Was happy to see that the traffic was no where near to what you see 90% of times here (and trust me, you'd never want to drive with that horrible traffic ) So I reached there and look at what I picked up!

Oooh yeah! Thats a lotta BDs and DVDs :D lemme list em.

BDs

1. Iron Man Limited edition
2. Journey to the Center of the Earth
3. Kung fu Panda
4. Batman Begins

DVDs

1. Predator
2. Independance Day
3. The Day After Tomorrow

And theres a PSN card and also a Fischer Price Cartoon DVD, that DVD was free. will see it... justcoz :P

As for the BDs, My brother bought it in a Buy 1 get 1 free offer from columbia house so Iron Man is the one he bought and BB is the free one, and I discovered that KungFu Panda was accidentall listed for "free" and ordered that ASAP, hehe (got a mail saying it was cancelled and then a "sorry, take it" later :P )

And Journey to the Center of the earth, just now I and my parents watched, it was a great movie.. I mean the BD comes with 4 pairs of 3D glasses and Both 3D and 2D versions on the Same disc .. AND a "digital copy" on a dvd, which I guess is a avi version or something of the whole movie. It has a CD key for it and everything, I dont know why it was give, but oh well. thats awesome, its 3 movie versions in 1!

The 3D effects did infact feel 3D-ish, and luckily it was more and better than Superman Returns (yeah, I saw that in 3D... in IMAX, lol)

As for the DVDs. I and my bro have a plan on buying almost all those old movies that we watched and loved. And with our complete Home theater set-up disaster movies with the extra blasts and eveything are top priority :P Ofcourse, its not like he bought all for direct price, my brother being the deal guy he is, always bought em in such a way that theres profits o matter whats, hehe 8)

He IMed me the other day saying he bought Ace Ventura Double Pack! and he wont send it.. that !@#!# :P

*Point B to C

Since I cae oh so far to take those things, I made sure that I made most of the milage and visited nearby shopping areas, so I went to the computer heaven of Andhra pradesh (CTC ) and first visited the Book depot there, its one of the hugest book selling place here.

First thing I saw was a "Guiness Book 2008" book and I immediately remembered this Story in GS (mine is 10th comment) I asked the guy if he had other versions and he said "I dont know" So I went deep into the shop, searching for new MAD mag issues (nope, still no issues, since 2+ years) and looking at various Amar Chitra Katah Books.

and Lo Behold What do I see?

Oh yeah! I got that thing.. I just couldnt help myself, but I just love General knowledge...as I put it

"I am always on a trivial pursuit for trivia"

As much as I love stories, I mostly love books that are information based, than novels and stuffs, have a ultra huge collection of magazines and stuff (8+ years of 2+ mag subscriptions :P ). Once I took a look at the book I saw so many things that I would just eat away, so many things that you wouldnt necessarily find written in articles all around the place, so it was an instant buy!

Official Price 1300 got it for 1100 :D

As for the other thing its a DK multimedia (remember, I hate I love maths?) CD on Human body which I bought for my uncle who runs a big tutorial. His methods of teaching are very homely and unique. He already had an old version of the thing which he used to show to students and teach but the disc got corrupt so I bought this new version (also compatible with Xp! :P )

*Alternate Path

Now instead of going home (Point A) from this place... I took a detour and encountered a shop which... sells games! I just tried my luck and asked them.. "left 4 dead hai kya?" (Do you have l4d?) and BAM... he said yes and got it! Woot! I was waiting to get my hands on this thing since a long time and I finally have it. So yeah.. if you are an indian and waiting for the game, just go and get it.. its out!

Just saw the opening cinematic, sure did describe what kind of experience Valve was planning for gamers to have. Now... I wonder if my first playthrough itself should be on Co-op or SP...

and Yeah my Steam ID is Reetesh. add me if you want to play along sometime :)

*To Point A, and Feorgotting

What? You never heard of Feorgotting? Well.. it could be because.. I made it up :P The thing is that, when coming back, I was wondering if I "put the CD back in after checking it" at the book shop (DK CD) And then I was thinking if put my Card back into the wallet after paying the bill. (even though at one point I remembered doing it) Soon, I started feeling that I checked for it and then removed it and didnt put it back in :lol:

Such kinds of loops went on happening as I rode back to point A, actually, this happens a LOT to me, I keep forgetting such things, JUST so that I can worry about it..its like there are two brains inside me :P

I coined this phenomenon as "fear+forgetting = feorgotting" always forgetting and getting that "fear" inside you if things were done right or not.

perfect example "Did I lock the doors while leaving or not"

*Mission Complete

So yeah, I came back took these pics, emptied around 70GB of HDD space, reorganized a lot of files, installed L4D, saw journey to the center of the earth and then.. wrote this! Thats all for this entry, oh yeah! did I forget to tell you theres a Wii Music there too!?

I dont know about you, but the game sold itself to me the instant I saw that demo by .. no not ravi, but this guy, J.C.Rodrigo Well, to be honest, I bought the game even before I saw the video, I just love psuedo music making games or what ever you want to call it (Passive Reactive Rhythm game etc etc) and I know that my mom will also like it, so why not buy it, and hey it has SMB 1-1 Music in it!!

See you soon then, lets hope theres more coming.. I heard TDK BD has come out today :twisted: