While I do acknowledge his immense contributions to pop music, dance, and culture, I don't consider any perverts or accused child molesters to be great people. He's a legend, yes, but I'm not a big fan of his music, so it's a sad truth that I'll remember him more for being mentally ill than for his musical and cultural legacy. This is just my opinion regarding the person who is universally referred to as the king of pop, and I won't be discussing this subject further.As the title suggests, this blog is not about Michael Jackson, so moving on...

Where has the time gone?

It's been a little more than 4 months since my last blog, the first 2 of which were spent focusing on my spirituality and my academics. The latter 2 were spent finishing up high school for good (graduated this past Tuesday - hooray for me!! ) and just enjoying the company of my friends and family.

I've thought a lot about "coming back" to Gamespot in terms of my level of activity and blogging and I've been torn on this. During the Great Lent, I "left" Gamespot in order to focus more on my spirituality and scholastics, and even after all the extra time I spent on those two things, I still had some free time left. I began spending that time entertaining myself with things other than Gamespot, such as my friends at school and church, and I very much enjoyed that time.

After Easter came and passed, I no longer had the same desire for Gamespot that I used to, last summer for example. I just preferred to spend more time with my friends in our senior year. I also started working weekends to fund my entertainment outside my house, new games, and gas for my new car, (2007 Civic LX - hooray for me!! ). This job took away the time that I would've likely spent blogging or being on Gamespot, and I didn't want to sacrifice anymore of my time to make room for GS ... so I waited.

That's not to say I had been completely absent as I still did make an effort to post on the forum every now and again, update my PS3 FAQ Thread as needed, and yes, I did keep up with most of my friends' blogs, even though I only commented on a scarce few. I was here for E3 and heard all of the big news, from MGS: Rising (360/PS3) and MGS: Peace Walker (PSP), to the PSP Go (which was leaked), to Project Natal, to FFXIV. I'm looking forward to Uncharted 2, God of War III, the new Metal Gears, and Assassin's Creed 2.

Now that high school is officially over, this past week marked the beginning of what should be the best summer of my life so far. And the best part is ... no ****ing schoolwork during summer ... EVER AGAIN!!! Hooray for me!!

What's changed?

Like I noted earlier, I now have my own car and I've officially graduated high school. Also, in an effort to further better my life, I've started taking my weight and my health seriously. At 5 foot 4 inches tall and 205 pounds, I believe I'm a 35 on the BMI chart, placing me well into the scope of obesity. I've accumulated all this weight after years of literally eating whatever I wanted without worrying about the consequences. I never worried too much about my body image and happily accepted the fat jokes from everyone I knew and even pitched in sometimes. I have a laid back attitude towards such jokes and I've never had any emotional issues regarding my body image.

Although I've always loved playing basketball and football with my friends, the rest of my life****was very inactive as my hobbies besides playing ball included watching TV, playing videogames, surfing the web / GS, and hanging out at a friend's house, all of which are rather sedentary activities. Working at Dunkin' Donuts the past two summers hasn't helped either. Now, I'm on a diet - it's not any specific plan - I'm just watching and limiting what I eat and making an effort to exercise more and be more active.

That's part of the reason why I probably won't ever be as active as I once was on GS, as I'm making a conscience effort to choose more active hobbies and make exercise a part of my day-to-day life. Helping me do this is my new 16GB iPod Touch and a Griffin case with armband that I now use when I run on the treadmill. My goal is to reach my target weight of about 150 pounds by summer's end. Hooray for me!!

Gaming News

In gaming related changes, I broke my promise to myself (which was that I wouldn't make any new game purchases until I completed all of my games at least once) and preordered inFamous in order to secure a copy of the Uncharted 2 MP Beta, and also get the Gigawatt blades. As most of you on my PSN friends list already, I love inFamous and have been playing it exclusively since the day I bought it. I completed the hero campaign after about 40 hours, and upon successful completion of the infamous campaign, I will have my first ever Platinum Trophy!!

Not that I'm some trophy enthusiast all-of-a-sudden, but after tracking down all 350 blast shards on my own, I think there's cause for celebration. Hooray for me!! Also, the fact that I'm usually a completionist when it comes to games, a Platinum Trophy really means I'm actually 100% done. I'm thinking of revisiting Uncharted for a Platinum Trophy in anticipation of Uncharted 2, and as insane as it sounds, I'm also gonna try for an R2 Platinum.

While it sounds like I've completely ignored the Uncharted 2 Beta, I have played it on one occasion. I played a few short rounds of cooperative play and immediately fell in love, as it's quite genius in its execution and its call for teamwork. The rest of my time with it was obviously spent in competitive play, and while it was of high quality, let me just say that I personally didn't enjoy it very much. It was far from bad or broken, but just not my styIe. I won't divulge any further information as I know quite a bit of you purposefully passed on this beta in order to wait until the full game to experience it.

I'm back ... sort of

I'm hesitant to say "I'm back" because I know I will never again be as active as I once was, but I am back in the sense that you should expect to see me: on the forums from time to time, commenting on your blogs every now and again, and posting blogs more often than once every few months. I've also wanted to make some more game reviews for the games that I love and I've even been mulling over an idea on how and when to do my own "Top 10 Games" blog series.

But hey, let me try not to get ahead of myself here and focus on being a little more active first.

Until next time, (which is hopefully shorter than 4 months ), have a great summer.

- Patrick

Those of you who know me well know that my religion is the most important aspect of how I live, of how I act, and most importantly, of who I am. My life is defined by my beliefs. Well, tomorrow marks the first day of the Great Lent this year - a 55 day fast before the Feast of the Resurrection, (or Easter as it commonly referred to ), during which I must make an effort to grow spirituality and further my relationship with God. One of many ways to accomplish this is to control the body by refraining from eating dairy products, meat prodcuts, and seafood. Another way is to sacrifice "fun-time" for the sake of spiritual activities such as reading the bible, praying, or praising God with hymns and spiritual songs.

Included in these sacrifices, for me at least, will be time spent: watching TV, playing videogames, and surfing the web / Gamespot. That doesn't mean I'll be completely gone for 55 days, but expect to see me here a lot less often than I usually am. I'll try my best not to miss any of your blogs, but don't expect to see many blogs from me, and don't expect to see me roaming the forums much. In fact, if you don't notice any difference that means I'm not doing enough.

You'll also notice that I've changed my avatar to a picture of Jesus as a constant reminder of the time of year. I've also changed my banner to a picture of the last supper with a beautiful quote I saw while searching for the picture. The quote reads "Are the things you're living for worth Christ dying for?" Apparently, it is the epitaph of Leonard Ravenhill - I don't know who that is but it really is an amazing quote that puts everything in perspective similarly to "What would Jesus do?" (WWJD). It's a great saying to keep in mind from now on.

Now regarding my previous blog, you'll notice I didn't make my usual comment(s) in response to the comments that you guys made. I was busy for several days after I made that blog, and once I got some time, I started typing up the comment only to have my internet browser crash on me half-way through and I got discouraged from typing it up again. Anyway, thanks for the comments and the advice. I did read all the comments, and Hazel's comment in particular spoke to me. I decided to try his "do whatever you want" advice and it's been going pretty well that way for the past couple of weeks. However, now is the time for me to exert a little more sefl-control as we enter the fast of the Great Lent this year.

Typically, it's been a tradition that my family, along with my close friends and relatives, go out to eat at a nice restaurant the last day before the fast to get our fill of meat, dairy, and/or seafood before we give them up for the better part of two months, so I may be gone later today. I'll try and respond to any comments I get for the rest of the day so they don't pile up on me again because I probably won't catch up again if they do.

God be with you all.

- Patrick

Videogames and Gamespot; how do you balance the two?

Ever since I joined Gamespot, I've been more excited about games, but I've been gaming less, as ironic as sounds. Sure, I've learned about (and purchased) so many of the amazing PS2 era games that I missed out on, most notably the Metal Gear Solid series, but all the time I spend on Gamespot takes time away from actually playing the games themselves.

The decline in the time I spend gaming has also been a result of the fact that my life is getting busier in the past couple of years with school, work, church, and friends - and I can drive on my own too so I'm out of the house much more often than my freshman or sophomore year in college.

However, the point still stands that my free time at home is spent doing one of 3 things: watching TV, surfing Gamespot, or gaming. I'm ignoring the TV because I actually don't watch as much TV as I used to - I only watch when there's something on (yeah, I used to be a loser who would just really watch anything). Therefore, my time spent on Gamespot is the thing that most directly takes away from my time gaming. And so when I look at those long lists of games I own but haven't played yet and games that I want but haven't bought yet, I'm saddened by my severe lack of gaming recently.

Now that my PS3 is in the basement, being on Gamespot is more convenient than playing games because my computer is right in my room on the second floor. Considering that I didn't play all that much when the PS3 was in the loft area, (second floor right next to my room), it's gotten really bad with the PS3 in the basement because of my laziness.

Ever since I started gaming, I very rarely would play on weekdays, and now that I'm on Gamespot, my free time on the weekdays (not watching TV / doing HW) has now gone to Gamespot completely. I usually plan to play on Fridays after school (4:00) until church (7:30) and Saturdays (3:00 if I have work - if not, then noon) until church (6:30) because I always leave my homework for Sundays anyway.

But with my social life really picking up in the past year, (again, because I drive myself everywhere now), a lot of that time is spent on my friends in real life. As a result of all of this, I'm really at a loss because my gaming time has now been reduced to almost nothing and if I were to cut back somewhere else in order to play more often, I would have to cut back on my time on Gamespot.

What's more, I'm writing this blog just a week after complaining about the general lack of activity on Gamespot recently, so I really feel hypocritical about this. As Green said, the irony is strong with me. But since many of you are active more during the weekends than the weekdays, I think it would be fine if I switched to gaming in my free time during the week, and going on Gamespot on weekends.

But for all of you reading this; I would like your opinion on this issue. Now that you all know about my situation, what would you all recommend me to do? Do you think it's a good idea to game on weekdays and post on weekends? I wouldn't be completely absent during the week either, but I wouldn't be on that much.

One last thing - I can finally see my banner again! Hooray!

You know where to leave your comments.

- Patrick