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Our daughter Zoe Elizabeth came into our lives on December 30th, 2003 at 4:58am.

She was 5 pounds, 6 ounces at the time of birth and because of this she is officially deemed (or nicknamed) “The Peanut”. Someday, when she’s old enough, she’ll realize just how goofy her father is, and hopefully she’ll accept it.

Here’s looking forward to the next 18-20 years!

Remember the Choose-Your-Own-Adventure series?

Books that would allow you as the reader to basically choose the path of the character — written in either a first or third person perspective.

For example, let’s say your character came to a point in the story wherein he or she had to choose whether or not they would tip a cow in the middle of Farmer Tim’s Field. Immediatedly following the text would be something along the lines of:

Will you either:

A) Tip the cow.
(please turn to page 23)

or

B) Decide not to tip the cow.
(please turn to page 99)

The fun in these books was re-reading them after reaching the end or if the character died as a result of your decision. Particulary if you were willing to go through it again and see an alternate ending to the story.

Seeing that we live in a digital age some people have created similar concepts such as Nick Piekos’ (of Blambot) Dead Ends.

Dead Ends “is an interactive story. At times you will have to decide the best course of action for the characters. Make a good choice and you’ll live to read some more.”

One of my favorite television sitcoms during the 80s was the wildly popular show ALF (1986-1990). The series starred an Alien Life Form whose spaceship crash landed into the garage of the Tanner Family in Los Angeles. Due to the fact his spaceship could not be repaired he was stuck on Earth without any hope of returning to his homeplanet, Melmac.

The Tanner Family agreed to hide ALF from the alien task force and learns of his planet’s favorite meal; cats. Although the Tanner’s cat Lucky is considered a delicacy on Melmac, ALF tried his best to not eat him even though his attempted to several times during the series.

In the article “Why I hate The Lord of the Rings” Larry Terenzi, contributing author, states his opinion in regards to the Tolkein trilogy. He basically describes his displeasure and monotony while watching the films as well as the lack of story (in the movies, not necessarily in the books).

The best part of the article in my opinion is when Ternenzi calls the characters ‘Merry and Pippin’ the ‘Cheech and Chong’ of Middle Earth.