Pull-List for 9/12/2012

Fanboys vs Zombies (6) ☐
The Massive (4) ☐
Demon Knights (0) ☐
Green Lantern Corps (0) ☐
Ravages (0) ☐
Resurrection Man (0) ☐
A vs X (11) ☐
Avenging Spidwr-Man (12) ☐
Fantastic Four (610) ☐
Scarlet Spider (9) ☐
Uncanny X-Men (18) ☐
Wolverine & the X-Men (16) ☐
Avengers Assemble (7) ☐
Team 7 (0)(if available if not digital) ☐ Cloak & Dagger Vol. 4 (1)(if available if not digital)

List too long.....

My Take On Wolverine & the X-Men 15........

Simply one of the best books out there and that continues with this issue. Art and fantastic story. The complete package!

Pull-List for 9/5/2012

Hypernaturals (3)
Before Watchmen Silk Spectre (3)
Earth (0)
Amazing Spider-Man (693)
Big Hero 6 (One Shot)
First X-Men (2)
Hawkeye (2)
Thanos Quest (One Shot)
Ultimate Comics Spider-Man (14)
Archer & Armstrong (2)

Looking forward to a bunch of these.

Pull-List for 8/29/2012

Higher Earth (4)
Justice League (12)
Amazing Spider-Man (11)
Captain Marvel (3)
Gambit (3)
Wolverine & the X-Men (15)

Short list this week.

Pull-List for 8/22/2012

Batman Incorporated (3)
Teen Titans (12)
Invincible (94)
Amazing Spider-Man (692)
Uncanny X-Men (17)
Planetoid (3)

Pull-List for 8/15/2012

Green Lantern Corps (12)
Red Hood & The Outlaws (12)
Saga (6)
Amazing Spider-Man (691)
Avengers vs. X-Men (10)
Captain Marvel (2)
Daredevil (17)

My take on Rock Creek Park and the Westridge Trail.............

In an effort to get more active I have returned to something that I have always enjoyed, hiking. When I 'hiked' before it was under totally different circumstances, I was in the military. I was an infantry soldier so 'road marching' was something that we did regularly. Technically 'road marching' isn't really an equivalent to hiking it's more like just average infantry terrain traveling. We would often be at a position and be given another position some random direction and distance away and told to go there as fast as possible, that is more like hiking to me. Well let's just say, when I was in the military I was in a lot better shape.

 This being my first hike since my military days my guide, we'll call him E7, took me on a fairly short hike. If I had to put a distance on it I'd say it was around three to four miles. We saw a few rather large Bullfrogs hiding under stones along the way and many beautiful points along the creek. What I learned is I need to build my leg strength and wind back up to what it used to be in my 'glory days'. I plan on going on some shorter hikes to aid in that. I found a nice short trail very close to my house. I will do that one shortly.

Pull-List For 8/8/2012

Fanboys vs. Zombies (5)
The Massive (3)
B.W. Ozymandius (2)
Demon Knights (12)
The Ravagers (4)
Resurrection Man (12)
Daredevil Annual (1)
Fantastic Four (609)
Scarlet Spider (8)
Spider*Men (4)
Gambit (1)
Archer & Armstrong (1) Avengers Assemble (6)

Now that's a list!

Pull-List For 8/1/2012

Higher Earth (3)
Hypernaturals (2)
Batwing (12)
Earth 2 (4)
Age of Apocalypse (6) (Can't remember if
I'm off of this one or not. If its in my box
I will skim it. If it looks better, I'll get it. If
not, dropping it.)
Avengers vs Xmen (9)
Avenging Spiderman (10)
Daredevil (16)
First Xmen (1)
Hawkeye (1)
Ultimate Comics Spiderman (13)

Whewwwwwww! A lot of books this week. Also there's a big sale at my local shop. They are having buy 2 trades get 1 free. Getting some mix of Sandman and Guardians of the Galaxy trades.

Pull-List for July 25

Looks like I have a light week (wallet exhales.....).

Teen Titans 11
Amazing Spiderman 690
Hit-Girl 2
Wolverine & The Xmen 14

My take on....... Batman Incorporate #2

This is going to be short and to the point. Wow! I'm glad that I never really got into Batman before. It's making reading the occasional Batman book even better now. B.I. is great. Definitely check it out. The art by Chris Burnham is fantastic!

James

My take on............ Demon Knights

Everytime I get home with my tall stack of comics I somehow always seem to end up with Demon Knights if not on the bottom, close to it. I am going to change that. From now on it will place higher for sure. I have been enjoying it since its launch last year. It reminds me of my Father he was an avid Conan reader, and every once and a while I would sneak a read of his books. I think that's where I got my love for fantasy. He used to tell me that books were his escape. He could just leave the real world behind and go somwhere else for a little while. And it seems DK is just that for me. No capes, no cowels, just swords, sorcery, excellent writing, and great art.

James

My take on.......... Daredevil #14

After hearing all of the hype surround Mark Waid's Daredevil I decided  that at the very least I should give it a shot. I went to my local shop and luckily they had almost all of the issues already released, and and the two issues that they didn't have I just bought digitally. I immediately started reading them and was very impressed. The writing was great, and the art, while not exactly my thing, fit the writing perfectly. I have been reading monthly ever since.

Issue #14 is pretty much more of the same solid writing with the addition of a new device that puts the Devil to the test. Without spoiling to much the senses he has come to trust and lean on in the absence of his sight are slowly stripped away only to leave him struggling to walk let alone soar through the skies as he usually does. The final page just brings it all together and leaves you anxious for the next issue.

Not only should you jump on now, but do yourself a favor and seek out the back issues. You won't be disappointed.

James

How to Spawn Slimes in Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition

I am going to tell you how to spawn slimes in Minecraft 360 Edition. The first thing you should do is:


1. Make stairs that go all the way down to bedrock.
2. Next, make a room in the dimensions of 40 x 40 x 4.*Note: The difficulty should be on peaceful.*
3. Now, you will need tons of torches. the torches prevent other mobs from spawning and slimes love light.
4. Now that you have the spawning area ready, don't bother it. Give it some time, they will not spawn as easily as a creeper or a zombie.

5. When you eventually check on your slime spawn and you hear the sound of someone slapping a    fish(roughly how it sounds), a slime may have spawned.

Picture of a slime.

I hope this helps you spawn slimes and get their slimeballs. Good luck!

I know a lot of people that play Modern Warfare 3 might have trouble coming up with a class to use. Whether it's an all around class, or for an objective based game mode, I can help. I will put up classes for everything from all around classes, to classes for rushing an sniping. I hope these classes help you succeed in Modern Warfare 3.

Reading List 7/4/2012

About a year ago I decided to return to comics. I really missed the great feeling of escape they provided me when I was younger. I thought I would just dip my toes back into the vast pool of comics and keep my reading list small. So a year and two or three short boxes later, and I am back in full-on 'collector mode'.


I thought that sharing my weekly reading list would be fun.


So here goes......


Reading List for 7/4/2012


Fanboys vs Zombies                   #4
Earth 2                                          #3
Invincible                                      #93
Avengers Vs. X-Men                  #7
Spider-Men                                 #2
Ultimate Comics Spider-Man    #12
Uncanny X-Men                          #12




I will try post some brief reviews here and there. I usually pick up my books bi-weekly. If I missed a good book let me know.




James

5 Things I Love About LauncherPro for Android

It has been a personal bone of contention that a lot of the reviews I have read have had less than complimentary things to say about Touchwiz 3.0. TW3 in my opinion is a perfectly good launcher for the normal smartphone user. I call the normal user 'the type of person who makes little to no adjustment to the aesthetics of the interface of their smartphone'. They receive their phone, fire it up, and go. No tweaks, minor and certainly not major, and they are perfectly content with that. That is not me! Whether I like the launcher or not, I am going to play around with and tweak the UI to something that I like.

Enter LauncherPro.

Currently I am using the free version of the application on my Samsung Vibrant. The paid version, which cost $2.99 via PayPal, adds some very nice looking widgets. I would be  more than happy to help the developer of the application Federico Carnales by purchasing, but I haven't used PayPal since my days of football card collecting. I wish the option to pay via Google Pay was available.

Now on to the list:

1. LauncherPro zips through everything. Swiping through home screens, loading preferences, or navigating the scrollable shortcut dock (I'll explain it further later.)
2. LauncherPro 'cooperates' well with Android 2.1 and specifically Samsung's tweaked UI. It leaves all other other options that you would usually have, and just adds its functionality.
3. The scrollable shortcut dock is an absolute stroke of genius and the gem of the application. It is a mini shortcut icon height, side scrollable bar that can house icons and save your home screens for larger, real estate hogging widgets.
4. It is highly customizable. Everything is tweak able (yes!!!). From the ability to back up your setup, auto-rotation on the home screen,  a couple high quality wallpapers, (a small feature but favorite of mine) the ability to hide the notification bar, and many more options.
5. Finally and quite simply, the obvious care and attention to detail that was put into the application. 

If I could ask for anything extra it would oddly be to make it easier to purchase the application. I'm sure re-establishing my PayPal would be painless, but with a robust payment system in place it seems weird when asked to pay by a different method.

LauncherPro is a first rate launcher application with all of the bells and whistles. Do yourself a favor install it and tweak to your hearts content.

-James-

My review of the Samsung Vibrant.

The T-Mobile Samsung Vibrant

The first thing I need to make clear in this review is I'm not one of these professional phone reviewers that carry three or four phones around at all times. The Vibrant is my only phone, my electronic lifeline. So if it doesn't do something as expected, or to my satisfaction, it's a big deal to me because I don't have other phones to fall back on. That being said, on to my impressions.

The Hardware

My last phone was a G1. I really liked the G1 from the start. All the detractors picked it apart, but the G1 was a solid all around phone that served me well from it's launch until I got the Vibrant. It wasn't a huge phone, but because of the physical keyboard it was definitely on the thick side. I also used an extended life battery for the majority of the time I used the G1, adding to it's thickness. The Vibrant is no G1!!! It is thin, smooth, and curvy. I have read on many sites that it felt 'plasticky and cheap'. I definitely don't agree with those assertions. It IS plastic, but it doesn't feel hollow or inexpensive at all. It feels as I believe the designers intended it to feel. Like a thin slab of solid material in your palm. It is light compared to other phones like the iPhone4 or the massive Android giant the HTC EVO. And even though it has a slight rear facing chin it feels extremely well balanced and sits in the hand well.

The front of the phone does slightly favor the iPhone 3G, the back is unique though, to say the least. It's glossy smooth, aside for the two tiny slits for the speaker grill, and the camera lens (no flash to be found). All of of the phones' style is on the back. Two different colored rear covers are provided, one blueish green and the other purple.  The only buttons to be found on the device are the power/sleep button on the right of the phone and the volume rocker on the left. One nice feature is a first for me to see on a phone. A handy little sliding door that covers the charging/syncing jack. Greatly appreciated by me because I tend to rip those little plastic attached covers off eventually. All in all the appearance of the pone is excellent. Business up front and all party in the back like those mullets we all love!

The battery life has been OK thus far. I got about 9 hours of heavy use out of it before I was in the low teens in remaining charge and forced to recharge it. I have only had it for about 24 hours and after I fall into a more normal pattern of use I don't see it being an issue. Although if a stylish extended life battery option presents itself I definitely will go that route.

The screen is without a doubt the gem of the phone. I have shown the phone to many people since I got it, and everyone of them was astounded by the beautiful 4.00" screen. Everything from the custom live wallpapers, to the pristine copy of Avatar impressed all, even the Apple fanboys and fangirls. The ability of the phone to monitor battery life and manage screen brightness will definitely come in handy!

The Software

A lot has been made of Touchwiz 3.0. I was worried that after using stock Android for so long I wouldn't like it. I was wrong. It isn't laggy, it is highly customizable, and extremely functional. Little additions like being able to change the sorting of the application tray, or being able to delete applications directly from the tray are excellent UI additions. I almost overlooked some features because I just wasn't used to their availability too. To reduce or increase the screen brightness one only needs to swipe their finger across the top of the screen. To message a contact just swipe left on the contact entry. To call them swipe right. The puzzle piece missed call or text message on the lock screen is simply brilliant! A puzzle piece appears on the lock screen and you simply drag it to the corresponding hole to respond.  

The Camera/Video Recorder

I use my phone's camera and video recorder in spur of the moment situations. If I am going somewhere that I think I will need or want to take pictures I take a dedicated point and shoot for that. So I don't expect point and shoot quality from my phone. That being said I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the pictures/video taken with the Vibrant. They were clear and colorful. There are a lot of settings for the camera and video recorder so sometimes it's merely a matter of finding the right setting for picture situation. Low light picture came out surprisingly clear and well lit. 

The availability to have your Picasa album in your phones picture gallery is a welcome addition as well. I am a big fan of cloud storage, so I was very happy to see this.

Call/Data Quality and GPS 

Since I got the Vibrant I have had no problem with signal issues that I didn't have with my G1. Like with the G1 being in elevators, deep basements, and some other structure can cause signal issues. Other than that I have had excellent signal and have yet to drop a call. Data rates seem to be fairly consistent and i haven't had any period of no 3G connectivity yet.

The Wrap Up

All in all I find this phone to be excellent in all categories save the GPS, which is extremely sensitive and frustrating coming from the G1. And the OK battery life. I would without a doubt recommend this phone to anyone who is positive they live and work in an area where T-Mobile coverage is good. The person I would not feel comfortable recommending this phone to is the person who is dependent on the GPS for travel. I can live with no location based searching, but if I got lost due to it I would be looking pulling out the old G1.