Things We Learned This Week

My LBP beta level is lost lost lost.

No idea what happened, but the LittleBigPlanet level I designed and published during the beta will not load. Can't play it or edit it (but it can be favorited!) Plenty of other beta levels survived the transition, but mine is a no-go. I've sent a curious email to Media Molecule.

In the meantime, I've started work on a Green Lantern-based level.

More reasons not to buy Guitar Hero World Tour.

Although it was initially reported that your Guitar Hero III DLC tracks would work in Guitar Hero World Tour, that has turned out to be a lie. Although maybe that early optimism was just more of Kotaku posting rumors with no substantiation. Either way, it's another negative for the column.

Aeropodcast #56, the one about the economy.

I was absent last week, but I returned for this week's Aeropodcast. It was just me and Joe Haygood, but we went off on some mad tangents.

I am so ready for this to be over.

I just hate politics. This better not be another one of those bullshit 51/49 percent split elections.

A Super Power Ranger.

Although Clark wanted to be Batman for his daycare's Halloween parade, we don't really have a nice full Batman suit. We do have an official Power Rangers costume, so we talked him into being the Red Ranger for school, and then he could be bargain-sweats Batman at home. By the time the day was over, however, Clark wanted to be a Power Ranger for the neighborhood trick-or-treating. With one change: he had to wear his Superman cape.

Last year, Rhonda put together an excellent Clark Kent-turning-into-Superman custume, with fake glasses, an askew tie, and a dress shirt half open with Superman jammies underneath. And people just thought Clark was a drunken businessman.

"I'm not normally superstitious..."

Yesterday I witnessed pure stupid in action. Guy in front of me at the checkout counter bought one item, and the bill came to exactly $6.66. "I don't like the sound of that," he muttered and then impulse-shopped some piece-of-crap Christmas ornament that was by the register.

Wow. Just, wow. The way people let themselves be ruled by fantastical nonsense.

We bought Clark something for Christmas.

We used to be able to get stuff into the cart and buy it without Clark noticing. Not any longer, as he joins us in this beautiful, materialistic world. So Christmas shopping is suddenly more challenging.

We found three Speed Racer car and driver action figure sets... Speed, Racer X, and Taejo Togokhan, who, you may know, gets almost no toy love. We saw them. He saw them. Rhonda and I surreptitiously agreed to get them for Christmas. So I grabbed the ones with the best paint apps (see what a good Dad I am?) and head for the checkout counter while Rhon distracted Clark.

But before I could get to the front of the store, I hear Clark running along after me because he found another toy he wanted to show me (it was those weirdly cute wooden preschool figures of Wolverine and Captain America... the Retconned World War II Buddies playset, I guess). Thinking quickly, I ditched the Speed Racer toys into a mop bucket on the corner of the aisle. But as soon as Clark gets to me, he rounds the corner, looks in the bucket, and says "Daddy, you got those toys stuck in there."

Rhonda corralled him and I did make the purchase (see above anecdote), but later in the car he asked to see the Speed Racer toys. We told him they were too expensive - which is NOT a lie, from a certain point of view. We told him we put them back - which is CLOSER to a lie, from a certain point of view. He said "But Daddy was carrying them!"

Here is your new Things Learned format.

Over the past few weeks I have found myself really hating the old format, with the odd right justified vertical rectangles. It was making the page too heavy on the right side. So this is what I came up with about ten minutes ago: thin horizontals with a quick white gradient, and accompanying text in blockquotes. It feels a little more balanced. I guess. What do you think?