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by
Joe - jgand@pcfootball.net
12/22/03
Well lads and lassies, it's that
time of year again. As promised, its time to look back at the
year that was and hope for a better year to come. In my case it
will be a brand new start in a brand new state.
As most of you know, I have been
unemployed for the past year due to the fact that my last job
laid me off the day after my birthday. Nice, huh? I immediately
hit the ground running searching the newspapers and the internet
for any good job lead I could find. Well, that is I did start
looking after I recovered from that damn virus that settled in
my throat. I put out at least 750 resumes this past year and
that got me about 35 interviews. Unfortunately it gained me 0
job offers.
So this past October with our
savings down to next to nothing and no more extensions on my
unemployment insurance my wife and I had to come to a very
painfull decision - we were going to try to borrow monwy from
her Godmother. Now Linnea is of the old school, she believes
that any job is a good job and that you have to get out there
and hit the bricks in order to get one. In other words she
thought I was sitting on my ass doing nothing but play Madden
all day long and not looking for a job. She also believes that
there is a right way to handle money (her way) and a wrong way
to handle money (everybody elses way), and that we had
squandered the money that my late mother had left us on
frivolous things. She would give us the money on one condition,
that we had to follow her list of demands so that she would see
that we were serious about turning our fortunes around.
She presented her list and we
checked it twice, and we set out doing her bidding in order to
prevent foreclosure on our house. Well we came down to the wire
and had just completed her list when she dropped a bomb on us.
Apparently, we (meaning me) had not done one of the items on her
list to her satisfaction, or at least she thought that I had
fucked it up somehow and now I was making excuses to cover my
own ass and get the money anyway. So she told us that she had to
really consider weather or not we had done enough to earn the
money, and she would be contacting us within a few days.
Well, wifey and I talked it over
and we came to the conclusion that she really didn't want to
give us the money no matter what we did, that she was afraid
that we would just waste it all on "stupid things".
Like what, food? We called her after a couple of days to tell
her to forget it, we didn't want the money anymore. It was not
worth what it was doing to the relationship we had with her, and
it wasn't worth the extra stress in our lives. Not only that but
we had come to another important decision. Since I still hadn't
been able to get a job and since it didn't look like I was going
to be getting one anytime soon, we had decided to do the one
thing that my mother made me promise never to do...
...we decided to sell the house
that I grew up in.
The last couple of months have
been absolutely unreal. We were researching places to move to,
talking with our agent, selling our house after being on the
market for 2 1/2 days, deciding on Boise, flying up to Boise,
freezing in Boise, finding a house in Boise, making an offer and
having it accepted, coming home and now packing up and getting
ready to move.
It's a wonder I've been able to
get any games of Madden in at all this year.
So having said all of that, it is
time for another year-end column. Subbmitted for your
consideration, I give you the Good, the Bad, and the downright
Idiotic...
Good - Madden 2004 comes out and
looks better and deeper than ever.
Bad - Again with the roster
editor?!?
Good - The ability to import our
artwork fro Madden 2003.
Bad - Having to start the roster
creation process all over again because we can't import rosters
from previous versions. Man, sometimes I really miss FBPro.
Good - Owner mode allows you to
run your favorite team as you think it should be run. Goodbye
St. Louise, heloooooooo Los Angeles Rams.
Bad - You can't even play the
all-time teams or the classice teams in franchise mode?!?
Good - Playmaker feature is
fantastic. It gives you even more options for audibles and
calling defenses.
Bad - Not being able to hide the
Instant Replay bar to take pictures because the game doesn't
recognize a 10th key on my Logitech Rumblepad.
Good - All the praise we have
been getting from people about the website.
Bad - People at MaddenMania who
still knock us as an "Anti-MM" site even though we
refuse to talk about them anymore.
Good - Jeremy Strauser interview.
Bad - Everyone else has one of
their own.
Good - The Instigators winning a
second straight Super Bowl.
Bad - Not having enough computer
time to write up the game re-caps as I would like.
Good - The opening of the ESports
Arena in San Diego with the possibility that more will open up
in a city near you.
Bad - Their website can no longer
be found and there is no word on the ventures progress.
Good - Professional gaming starts
up.
Bad - Very few if any sports
titles are offered. Folks, Madden, FIFA and NHL titles would be
perfect for your leagues.
Good - The Madden Challenge
expands to 32 cities.
Bad - PS2 version only.
Good - PCFootball.net aquired by
a partnership of BigDaddyCool, BigBaldBen, Concussion, JStrape,
Crewe and Phenom.
Bad - Bret's need to sell the
site in the first place.
Good - My pledge to never mention
the name David Branda again in my column nor talk about his
exploits.
Idiotic - David telling
romeshomey that he should abort his child.
Good - David finally doing the
right thing and giving up control of MadenMania.
Business as usual - He turned
control over to MadSci who promised to hold a grudge against us
and to continue to bash PCF whenever he got the chance. I guess
some people never grow up.
Admirable - The desire of people
like Sen. Joe Lieberman to keep M-rated games out of the hands
of minors.
Idiotic - The thought that
legislation is a substitute for good parenting.
Good - The intentions of Calif.
Assemblyman Leland Yee. He is trying to push through a bill to
make it illegal to sell violent games to minors as a way to keep
them from getting M-rated games like Vice City.
Bad - The way that the law is
presently written, it could keep more than just M-rated games
out of the hands of minors. It could keep games like Madden out
of their hands since the law says violent games and not M-rated
games.
Good - The g4TV network. For
those of you out there who have it on your systems you know what
I'm talking about. These guys and gals do a fantastic job of
keeping all of us abreast of the latest news and happenings in
the world of gaming. Here's hoping that they continue to do this
marvelous job for many years to come.
Bad - As of this writing, it is
still not available in Boise. Sigh. Guess I have to write a lot
of e-mails and make a lot of phone calls.
Good - Plenty of free time to
play Madden.
Bad - Plenty of free time to play
Madden.
Good - Well, I at least got some
good job interviews this year.
Bad - No job offers from any of
them.
Good - There seemed to be plenty
of jobs out there.
Bad - There were plenty of people
applying for those jobs. I would hear stories about how people
would be inundated with resumes the first day their ad came out.
Everyone seemed to be shocked that the job market was so bad out
there.
Idiotic - All of those
salesmenzas who wanted to bring me into their world and be a
telemarketer! Offer me a real job pal!!
Really Idiotic - All those
letters to the editor that said they were tire of the unemployed
spounging off of the government, and that we should just get off
of our asses and get a job. What the hell do you think I was
trying to do this past year?!?
Inflaming - Linnea telling me
that even if I got a part-time job that didn't pay me as much as
my last job did she still wouldn't help us out because I wasn't
trying hard enough. That was the moment I decided to sell the
house and get out of California because I wanted to get away
from her.
Good - Grey Davis, you're fired!
Congratulations Governor Terminator!
Bad - It didn't happen soon
enough to turn the economy around and get me a job.
Idiotic - The notion in the rest
of the country that California had finally lost it. Hey, if he
were in the private sector, and he had performed the job as
badly as this, he would have been fired a long time ago. so why
is this any different?
Good - I got a new (used) car. I
got a Saturn like I have been wanting for a few years now.
Bad - My 1989 Nissan couldn't be
smogged because the cables to the computer burned out. So I
couldn't drive it after the registration expired which was on
Christmas Eve.
Good - My wife and I will always
have a roof over our heads.
Bad - It won't be the roof that I
grew up under because we had to sell it in order to survive.
Good - Micheal Vick makes the
cover for Madden 2004.
Bad - The Madden Curse -
SNAAAAAAAP!!!!!
Great - A 13 year veteran of the
NYPD Finest Football Squad e-mailing me to thank me for the NYPD/FDNY
9/11 tribute rosters.
Nothing bad about that.
Good - They're going to build a
monument to 9/11 near Ground Zero.
Bad - What the hell is that glass
tower?!? Build a statue of the firefighters raising the flag
under a dome with all the names of the victems surrounding it
instead for crissakes!
Good - My decision to fill in the
time until I do find a job in Boise by writing a book. A guide
for parents on games, gamers, what games are safe for their
kids, the myths and misconceptions about games and gamers, and
the self-important twits who want to spoil our fun.
Bad - All the research that goes
into writing this thing.
Idiots - All the so-called
activists who try to portray us as a bunch of serial killers in
waiting. People like Jack Thompson, who seems to have a vendetta
against us, and the Mothers Against Videogame Addiction and
Violence (MAVAV) who seem hell-bent on abolishing all forms of
gaming and punishing anyone who plays them by portraying us as
racists and sexists.
Good - The deal that we got in
Boise. The house we sold was 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 1650
square feet for $381,500. We bought a 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom,
1900 square foot house with a spa in the backyard for $149,900!
Bad - Flying back and forth to
and from Boise. God, I hate not being in control.
Good - The thought that in a
couple of weeks, my wife and I will be out of earthquake
country. We will be in a place where the mood is so much more
pleasent than it is in SoCal right now. We will be in a place
where the people are friendly, the air is cleaner, and the
traffic is less congested.
Bad - Packing up and moving all
of our stuff up there. Not to mention the fact that we have to
transport our three cats up there ourselves. These creatures
hate riding in the car because we do noting but take them to the
vet. Now we have to be on the road with them for 14 hours?!?
Whose brilliant idea was this again?
Good - At least the grocery
workers in Idaho aren't on strike.
Idiotic - The stiking grocery
workers harrassing and threatening any woman or child who
crosses the line. They even assault sick kids who go to the
pharmacy for their medicine. What's wrong gang, you don't have
the balls to try to harass a man? Try that shit on me and see
what happens. Then we'll see how good your medical coverage
really is.
Really idiotic - The grocery
workers thinking that things will go back to normal after the
strike is over. Right. I can just imagine all the shit that is
going to be handed to them by the very same customers they've
been yelling at, and the only thing they can do is stand there,
smile sweetly and say "thank you sir, may I have
another?"
Thanks - To everyone on the
boards for your support of this site this year. Also thanks to
you for your words of encouragement during my job search and
move. Bret, Phenom, Ben Jaq, Concussion, Crewe, Alandawg,
skinsfan, rigg, yick, Tider and all the rest of you...you guys
are the best.
Thanks also to my wife Molly for
putting up with me this year. This has been one of the most
trying times of our lives as well as our marriage, and I
couldn't have picked a better partner to go through it with.
Everybody out there, have a very
Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy New year.
Until next year...
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