If I asked you to name your favorite TV show, could you do it?

I mean, could you name just one? From your whole life, there’s only one? Because maybe when you were younger you loved Scooby Doo. As a teenager, maybe it was Buffy or Battlestar Galactica (the original). But as an adult, it might be CSI or Lost. Although it seems like the shows you watch now are your favorites, maybe you’re forgetting just how much you loved a show when you were younger. Your Mom and Dad could tell you they couldn’t get you up at 7 AM for school but you were up at 6 AM to watch those cartoons on Saturday morning, in your pajamas, eating cereal. You wanted the lunchbox, the action figures or stuffed toys, maybe even a board game. You imagined yourself in the show. Your devotion was almost fanatical.

The point is that you can pick a favorite show now, because it is recent and familiar and just seems so much better. But it is not necessary accurate when looking through the window of your entire life. In retrospect, watching those TV shows in the past now, as an adult, gives you feelings of nostalgia and naivety at the same time, yet you’d have to truly re-live the experience from a child’s point of view to remember the thrill.

For this reason, you won’t find me pointing out one show that was better than anything else I ever watched. But you may find me referring to my favorite show right now, or when I was 7 years old. So, let’s blast to the past and talk about that first show I was hooked on: Scooby Doo.

From Wiki:

“Scooby-Doo is a long-running American animated series produced for Saturday morning television in several different versions from 1969 to the present. The original series, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, was created for Hanna-Barbera Productions by writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears, CBS executive Fred Silverman and character designer Iwao Takamoto. Hanna-Barbera produced numerous spin-offs and related works until being absorbed in 1997 into Warner Bros. Animation, which has handled production since then. Although the format of the show and the cast (and ages) of characters have varied significantly over the years, the most familiar versions of the show feature a talking dog named Scooby-Doo and four teenagers: Fred “Freddie” Jones, Daphne Blake, Velma Dinkley, and Norville “Shaggy” Rogers.

These five characters (officially collectively known as “Mystery, Inc.”, but never referred to as such in the original series) drive around the world in a van called the “Mystery Machine”, and solve mysteries typically involving tales of ghosts and other supernatural forces. At the end of each episode, the supernatural forces turn out to have a rational explanation, typically criminal plots involving costumes, latex masks and special effects intended to frighten or distract. Later versions of Scooby-Doo featured different variations on the show’s supernatural theme, and include characters such as Scooby’s cousin Scooby-Dum and nephew Scrappy-Doo in addition to or instead of some of the original characters.

Scooby-Doo was originally broadcast on CBS from 1969 to 1976, when it moved to ABC. ABC aired the show until canceling it in 1986, and presented a spin-off, A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, from 1988 until 1991. A new Scooby-Doo series, What’s New, Scooby-Doo?, aired on the WB Network during the Kids’ WB programming block from 2002 until 2005. The current Scooby-Doo series, Shaggy & Scooby-Doo Get a Clue!, airs Saturday mornings on The CW network. Repeats of the original series, as well as second-run episodes of What’s New, Scooby-Doo?, are broadcast frequently on the Cartoon Network and Boomerang in the United States and other countries.”

I was devoted to Scooby Doo before we even had a TV. My Mom had moved out of her parents house and we were on our own (she hadn’t met my stepdad yet). She didn’t have enough money to buy a TV, though. So how did I follow Scooby Doo? The show ran on CBS. In Portland, the CBS affiliate is KOIN 6, which is also broadcast on FM radio at 88.1. So I would sit at the table, eating cereal while listening to the voices on the radio. This is how it was done before TV – kids listening to radio programs like the Lone Ranger or Dick Tracy. That may explain my passion for old radios.

Eventually we got a TV. Whether on TV or radio, I never missed an episode. We couldn’t afford Scooby Doo toys, although my Mom did get me coloring books for my birthday. Scooby Doo was eventually replaced in my heart by Speed Racer and Hong Kong Phooey (which were in turn replaced by something else). But it is still an incredible show that has left quite a legacy, with versions running for over 30 years and counting, a move to Warner Brothers, 2 live-action feature films, tons of toys, and countless imitators. I still take a guilty pleasure in watching it, because although Speed Racer and Hong Kong Phooey have me scratching my head, wondering how I could have watched something that dumb, Scooby Doo still feels hip after all these years.

Let me take you back to the summer of 1977 for a curly-haired 10-year-old boy…

Star Wars was absolutely blowing people away in the theater. But at my house, there was nothing to do except watch TV and play with Hot Wheels.

Into this gap came Pong. That summer the Pong market crashed as imitators flooded the market, and my Dad felt they were finally cheap enough to pick one up. My envious friends spent many hours at my house playing Pong.

Later that Christmas, my friend’s dad trumped us by picking up an Atari 2600 system. Now it was I who was green with envy, sitting in my friend’s house playing Combat and Night Driver. And after that, another friend scored an Odyssey with the game Quest for the Rings. I had fallen to the back of the pack with my sad, little-used Pong system.

A curious thing happened during this time. Our dads had been sucked into the spirit of one-upmanship. And in 1980, thanks to my Dad perpetuating the cycle, I became the proud owner of an Intellivision game system. This was one of the best systems I ever owned, with excellent games like Hockey, Baseball, Astrosmash, Space Battle, Space Armada, Dungeons and Dragons, and Night Stalker. My friends’ systems gathered dust as the Intellivision became the hit of the neighborhood.

In 1984 my Intellivision made way for a Commodore 64 as I convinced my Dad I needed a computer for “educational” purposes. In this new age of 5.25″ floppies, joysicks, POKE commands, and a full keyboard was forged my desire to play RPGs and racing games such as Telengard, Sword of Fargoal, Racing Destruction Set, Pitstop, Phantasie II, Gateway to Apshai, Hillsfar, The Hobbit, and one of the greatest RPGs ever, Ultima III. The Intellivision was passed on to Grandpa, who became addicted to Night Stalker like it was crack.

After I left home and joined the military in 1986, I bought an Amiga 1000, and eventually sold this to buy an Amiga 1200. Great graphics and sound made playing games like F-18, Faery Tale Adventure, Bard’s Tale, Defender of the Crown, Test Drive, Ultima 5, Questron, Shadow of the Beast, and Mindwalker, an absolute blast. Grandpa got the C64 and switched his addiction to Boulderdash.

As the Amiga community began to dry up I stopped playing games for awhile. I started buying PC games, even rebuilding my entire computer to meet the requirements for playing Ultima 9. However, PC software almost killed the joy of video games for me, with buggy software and patches, constantly having to upgrade my system, and irritating copy protection schemes to deal with. After another gaming break, I got back into it when the PS2, Gamecube, and Xbox started slugging it out in what I think will be remembered as the greatest gaming generation of all time. I do still have my Amiga 1200, though, and to this day I only play 1 PC game: Microprose’s Magic the Gathering.

My first next gen system is the Xbox 360, purchased 1 year after launch. It is still running strong without any signs of the dreaded Red Rings of Death. I’m hoping to obtain a PS3 soon.

In future entries I’ll discuss current and previous generation systems in more detail.

It seems like video games have always been a part of my life – it’s hard to imagine life without them. They’ve brought me years of entertainment and sparked my creativity, even driving me towards a degree in Computer Science.

I still expect to be playing games when I’m 60. You see, that is the gift my Grandpa has left me. Though he has since passed on, he showed me not only could he play and enjoy games at an older age, but that he could switch from one generation to the next and maintain the fun factor. And if my reflexes desert me when I’m 60? Well, there’s always the Wii…

This is my first entry on 80s-style melodic rock, my favorite type of music. My favorite band of the 80s is Great White. Per Wiki:

“Great White is an American blues-based Glam metal and Hard Rock band formed in Los Angeles that gained popularity during the 1980s and early 1990s. The band released several popular albums in the late 1980s and gained airplay on MTV with music videos for songs like “Once Bitten, Twice Shy”. The band reached their peak popularity with the album “…Twice Shy” in 1989, but their success soon declined along with most other bands in their genre.

The band continued to release new material into the 1990s, although none of their material charted in the United States. In 2003, the band made headlines when The Station nightclub fire led to the deaths of 100 people in West Warwick, Rhode Island, including the band’s guitarist Ty Longley, who had been a member of the band for three years. Great White made a comeback in 2007 with the release of a new album and an accompanying tour with the band’s classic line-up.”

Between the Wiki page, the band’s homepage, and fan sites, there is plenty more reading material I’ll not go into here. I’ll merely discuss what the band and their music means to me on a personal level.

I first heard Great White back in the summer of ‘84, when the local Portland station KRCK 101 played “Stick It”. It was very different from other types of music being played on the station back then, which consisted of what is now considered “classic rock” like Led Zepplin, early Van Halen and AC-DC, Pink Floyd, and Journey, to name a few. It had much more of a melodic sound than the classic stuff, and really appealed to me.

I missed the Shot in the Dark album while I was spending a year in hell in Korea (but that’s another story). Then while living in L.A. in 1987, I started hearing KNAC and KLOS playing “Rock Me”, which I think is one of the greatest rock songs ever recorded. Even the video is awesome, with a hot woman in a tight wetsuit and a speargun. This was the first single off the album “Once Bitten”.

Every song on this album is great. As far as I’m concerned, there’s no filler, every song has a great melody. There is an atmosphere in the recordings I really find appealing. When I listen to it I’m reminded of cruising down the Sunset strip at night and the L.A. beach cities by day with the windows open and this CD cranked. Those were some good times.

I discovered “Shot in the Dark” after the “Once Bitten” release, and feel it is almost as good – similar atmosphere and sound, great melodies, similar track layout, with just a slight notch below “Once Bitten” in songwriting.

I never really cared much for the albums that followed, but “once Bitten” is, for me, the best album of all 80s melodic rock.

I live on the beautiful Washougal River in Washington State. Took a vacation week to get some remodeling done. As I was grouting tile in the basement, 2 noisy Canadian Geese showed up. Wish I had a telephoto.

The outside of the house with new windows installed.

New windows from the inside.

It’s hard to believe it’s only been a month and a week since I couldn’t find my car…

I’m going to open this blog with my feelings on Terry Goodkind’s last book in the Sword of Truth series, Confessor, which I finished reading 2 months ago. I’m not going to call it a review. I’m not a critic and don’t get paid as such. I don’t presume to know what anyone else likes or dislikes. This is simply my impression. Spoilers to follow.

I’m an avid reader of fantasy fiction. I have an extensive collection of both paperbacks and hardbacks. I’ve started buying more hardbacks in the last 5-6 years because 1) I think they look better on a bookshelf in my library and 2) as I get older and my vision gets worse, the large print of a hardback is easier to read, and I know I’ll be re-reading these books 20 years down the road. I have the entire Sword of Truth series in hardback.

Let me start by saying that parts of the book were absolutely riviting. One night I stayed up so late to read it that I only got 4 hours of sleep before going into work. The first two-thirds of the book jump between Richard in the enemy camp and his friends preparing for the siege. The portion devoted to Richard in the games (and the battle afterwards) is worth the price of the book alone.

The ending has me puzzled. Everything after the battle feels anti-climatic. The villains go down without so much as a whimper. I wish I had some insight into Goodkind’s thought process. Did he plan this all along? Was he rushed to get the book out? Did he just want the series to be over? Did he have to stretch it out to a certain number of pages? Was he happy with the result?

This book is getting slammed in the user reviews over at Amazon.com. An average of 3.5 stars is the current rating, which is not great for the ending book of the series, especially for someone of Goodkind’s stature. The positive reviews are usually something simple like “good book” or “wonderful conclusion to the series” or “it was everything I hoped for”. That tells you a lot about what level of reader would give this book 5 stars.

The negative reviews are long, detailed, and for the most part, justified. Those criticisms haven’t changed since the last several books. A series that started with some great fantasy elements (the Mriswrath Cape, the Sword of Truth, Sorcerer’s Sand, the Slyph, Prophecies) and creatures (Gars, Dragons, Mriswrath) has turned into a philosophy lecture with pages and pages of monologue. The monologue is preachy and over-explanitory. Goodkind loves to repeatedly hammer home the same points paragraph after paragraph, book after book, as if the reader is too dumb to understand those points the first time they were made.

The characters, who were once quite developed and complex, and part of the action, now only exist to deliver the monologue, or to listen impassively as pages of monologue are directed at them. Others, like Zedd, Chase, and Verna, might as well not exist at all due to the inconsequential role they play.

Goodkind still has the ability to tell a great story, and to entertain me. Had the story ended after the big battle, I would have been satisfied. His final book, however, is a reflection of the entire series: a mixture of oft-realized excellence and long-worn-out-its-welcome philosophy that has come sputtering to an end.

I’ve been blogging for a couple of years over at IGN. While I do like the community there, despite a vast range of topics it is very videogame-centric (as you would expect). Recently I tried Blogger, MS Spaces, Xanga, and Myspace.

I thought Blogger would mesh well with my gmail account, but there is no sense of community there and I never received one post on any of my blogs.

Myspace was worse. It is full of incredibly strange people with bizzare looking pages. Many people (women) have set their accounts to private to avoid being hassled by men. It’s funny to think that was once a place that was primarily a kid site until the adults and celebrities took it over.

MS Spaces has lots and lots of young people and is more social than thoughtful. I have nothing against the younger crowd, as there are many at IGN. But IGN has a great mix of ages. I’m 41, and I don’t have much in common from what I ran into at Spaces.

When I went to Xanga I thought it would be the main competition to WordPress for my attention. Now, Xanga has a good text-search features, as opposed to the link-search feature of WordPress. However, when I searched for topics that interested me, I found far more appealing threads on WordPress than Xanga. As you can see from the title of my blog, I like mythical creatures. All the ones I really would like to use as usernames were taken at Xanga. So here I am, Hippogriff at WordPress.

The main reason I’ve always wanted a blog is to find other people like myself that share similar interests. Given the things I like, that’s hard to do in a city of a million people. I could spend years trying to find those people. Here, I hope to find them as fast as I can type.

Here’s some of the things I’d like to use this blog for:

• Book reviews, particularly Fantasy Fiction. I’m writing a book myself, and have an extensive library of the genre.
• Movie and TV show reviews, mostly action/adventure and sci-fi, and collectibles.
• Computers – problems, resolutions, software. I build my own PCs and do DVD authoring.
• Hi tech stuff – I have an Creative mp3 player, Treo phone, and will be building a home theater next year.
• Games – video games, pinball machines, board games, card games. My favorite PC game, Microprose’s Magic the Gathering.
• Digital photography and travel. I’m hoping to go to Europe soon.
• My favorite music, 80s & 90s melodic rock, musical instruments I have/want, and songs I’m writing.
• Home remodeling and gardening/landscaping.
• Portland Trailblazers!

You know where I’ve been and where I’m going. I hope you’ll hang around as Hippogriff takes flight.