Story Time With Uncle Noggins: Swashbuckler!

this wasn't us but it very well could have been. 

In 3rd grade my class had just one computer that we all had to share.  It was like an AppleII or something and was coveted as fuck.  Gen-Xer's know this was pretty much the style of the time.  One computer per class or per several classes and one VHS and TV wheeled into the class on a cart to watch movies.  You know. 

The class was divided into groups of 3 or 4 kids for designated "computer time". Which sounds way cooler than it was.  Basically were supposed to play a math program on it.  Somehow they figured kids forgot it was math because it was on a computer screen.  Also, 4 less kids to deal with while you teach your class.  Win-win right?  

It must have been nearing the end of the school year because one day the teacher let us start unsupervised since we'd done it so many times by that point she trusted us enough to not babysit us,  even tho the computer was like I said, coveted as fuck.  Honestly I'm surprised she took her eyes off us at all.  It was like having a brand new Lamborghini parked in the classroom and she just let four 3rd graders just fuck around pushing buttons and flipping switches in it for 20 mins.   Anyway, I think it was Jake who put the floppy disk in upside down by accident and it instead of the boring math program it booted up something else. 

There was a picture of a pirate with and eyepatch and a sword fighting another guy with the title "Swashbuckler".  We were all in awe.  We knew it wasn't the program we were supposed to be playing but it was awesome! Cautiously we started hitting buttons and got it to start. It brought up another screen with a pirate holding a sword and then some skeleton enemies came at you.  We knew this was some kind of video game and spent that entire computer math session trying to learn the controls.  

But alas, time was up and we went back to our seats. Eagerly awaiting the next "computer time "session.  I think it was a couple days later and it was our group's turn again. The math program was already booted up awaiting our lesson. 

Honestly I this is more how I remember it. 
Not sure we had a color monitor.

Before we started we all kind of looked at each other in silent agreement.  We take a quick look to make sure no one is watching and Jake ejects the disk, flips it over and puts it back in.  A couple disk drive clicking and grinding sounds and boom, we're back on the pirate ship.  Surprisingly we didn't get caught, figured out more of the controls and the next computer time we played it again and did for like 3 more times. We all started to get good at it until one day Mrs. Rios caught us and we just played dumb like "we thought this was what we were supposed to do, it was on the disk you gave us to put in"  We didn't get in trouble but she made sure we booted up the right thing and kept an eye on us after that.  No more fighting reanimated skeletons on the high seas.  Our swashbucklin' days were over.

Swashbuckler is a fighting game created by Paul Stephenson for the Apple II and published by Datamost in 1982.^[1] The player controls a sword-wielding swashbuckler who must fight and dispatch various attackers. Combat occurs in a wooden-beamed ship's hold littered with skeletons and cobwebs, which the player views from the side. - Wikipedia

Every time I hear the word swashbuckler now I think of this brief moment when 4 dumb 8yr olds got a taste of the hacker life.  

Noggins TV Party Friday Night Long Winded Extravaganza!

Like a lot of people most of my TV watching has been consumed by Star Wars or MCU lately so I'm taking a breather to watch other stuff.  (Andor is really good and She Hulk and Ms. Marvel were great BTW) My guilty pleasure recently has been young adult sci-fi/fantasy.  My friend Rosie calls it “Kids on bikes”  probably because of Stranger Things.  (Just Googled out of curiosity and Kids on Bikes is an actual genre.  Makes sense, Goonies, Stand By Me, Super 8 - Duh)  Stranger Things was a good series but I thought the last season was the final season so I spent a long time being upset with the ending.  Apparently there's one more season so hopeful they can wrap it up in a satisfying way.  I’ve been binging shows in this genre like Secret of Sulphur Springs and Mysterious Benedict Society.  When I saw the trailers for Paper Girls I knew I needed it in my life.  That show was cool but it had lack of support from Amazon and they cancelled it before it could really have a change to get going.  I've started reading the graphic novels it's based on so I can find out what happens.  It's peak Kids On Bikes.    Anyway,  if you’re into that kind of thing, look em up. 

Recently I accidentally started watching the cartoon GravityFalls when it started playing after some other Disney+ thing.  There’s a ton of episodes so it’s always just there when I need it.  I love that it’s kind of set in the Pacific North West woods where I live and plays up the nostalgia of the old road-side attractions.  Theres Mystery Spot in Santa Cruz mountains and one near me called Confusion Hill.  In the show it's the Mystery Shack and they sell big foot trinkets and stuff like that.  Most of that stuff is actually real in Gravity Falls and these two kids get caught up in it while they navigate their awkward adolescence.  

If it’s not Kids on Bikes it’s usually something sci-fi related.  I blasted through all the Star Trek stuff already and looking forward to new seasons of Strange New Worlds, Discovery and Picard.  Not into the animated ones tho because despite my new found like of Gravity Falls, I’m not huge on cartoons.  That being said, Death Love and Robots is entertaining as fuck.  Definitely check that out.  It’s more animation than cartoon if that makes any sense.  Crap, now I have to admit here that I’ve been watching and loving Rick & Morty too. Damnit, I guess I do like cartoons.  Not many tho.  Don’t tell anyone.  

There’s a brand new Quantum Leap series that just started.  It’s like a sequel to the original series from the 90’s with Scott Bacula.  It takes place in present day but a new team is using the same tech from the old Quantum Leap project.  One of the main scientists working on in, Ben Song inexplicably and unexpectedly uses the machine to leap through time like Sam Beckett did in the original show.  They can communicate with him via hologram like Al did in the old series but Ben has amnesia as a side effect.  This one focuses more on the team trying to figure out why he leaped without telling anyone, while investigating a nefarious antagonist who is trying to undermine their work.   I’m into it.  It’s not perfect but it scratches the itch.  

Since it was just Halloween there’s been a ton of horror and spooky stuff being suggested on all the streaming services.  I was home alone last weekend and realized that I really don’t need that kind of entertainment any more.   I’ve had on and off Hellraiser nightmares since 1989 and I hate it.  It’s like I’m really being fucked with by cenobites and I’m in that fucked up hell world trying to escape.  I watched all the horror movies and stuff back in the day but for some reason Hellraiser really did damage to me as a kid.   Way to go, Clive Barker.  So anyway I ended up skipping most of those while I was alone in the dark.  Despite this, our friends really wanted to watch this new horror movie I’d never really heard much about called Barbarian so we agreed to go to their house and watch it. Safely with friends and burritos.   

As the tension started to build in the first act and into the second act I was again reminded of why I hate most modern horror movies.  The horror parts hinge on one or two major dumb shit stupid illogical bad choices by the main character.  So then I’m more angry that my intelligence is being insulted than frightened.  Yelling at the screen at the idiot who despite having many clear warning signs, decides to return to the scary torture basement.  The rest of the movie just sort of followed a natural course of events more or less.  As natural as they could be given the circumstances the morons keep putting themselves into.  The ending was more satisfying than I thought it would be.  But the stupid shit from the beginning just made me hate it.  And as I said before this is usually how I feel about horror.  There’s a new movie that was getting buzz on Twitter called Terrifier 2.  I never heard of the first one but the buzz was that people were passing out and barfing in the theater.  I saw a short clip of one of the scenes and apparently it’s just people being brutally mutilated by a demented clown.  My first thought was that anyone who even came close to the level of injury and fear would either pass out from shock or just die from blood loss before the truly shocking things that happen, happen.  Sorry demented clown, no screaming for you.    It’s totally stupid and the level of disbelief I need to suspend for this to actually frighten me takes me out of it.  I’m not scared or disgusted I’m just pissed off at how unbelievable it is.  Hellraiser on the other hand has this creepy otherworldly evil to it that really creeps me out.  The evil in it exists within and comes from an alternate dimension that automatically removes any real-world rules and that scares the shit out of me.   

Another horror movie that wasn’t that popular but stuck with me was Deliver Us From Evil, not because it was scary or that original for a horror topic but because it was based on true events.  I’m not saying people were really possessed but a real cop really had to investigate this and saw what he reported and whatever it was scared the shit out of him.  That freaks me out.  

Speaking of dumb shits that keep doing dumb shit to make their situation worse; I just binged the Netflix series Inside Man.   It follows two different plot lines that converge sort of.  A guy is on death row but he’s like an expert in criminology so people come to him for help to solve cases.  This story, while eerily close to Silence Of The Lambs is pretty good and the actors and characters are likable.  The other plot line is one of my favorite Doctor Who actors, David Tennant.  He plays a small town vicar in England who receives a flash drive from a troubled youth from his church.  The kid says not to look at it but just take it away from him.  Accidentally gets opened by his son’s in-home maths tutor who immediately assumes the son of being the owner of drive and the horrible things on it. (child porn)  The vicar tries to explain who's it is, but the tutor is kind of a bitch and wont listen to him.  So in trying to explain and defend his son he argues with her and physically tries to keep her from leaving.  One bad decision leads to another and it ends up with him and his wife contemplating murdering the tutor who’s now locked in the cellar adamant that she's going to call the cops on their son.  While things are now out of hand, it’s not totally too late to just try to have a conversation where they can let her go but the tutor is a psycho and cuts herself up and bleeds and pisses all over the cellar “so they know I was here”  ugg.  She's a real piece of work throughout.  Anyway it’s just frustrating to see intelligent normal people act so stupidly and irrationally.   Oh yea -Sorry spoilers.  But really I’m doing you a favor because it was all just so fucking stupid I would never recommend this show.  Coincidentally, the guy in prison is also helping the tutor’s friend find her and instead of just telling her friend where she is he plays this dumb cat and mouse game which allows the shit with the vicar and the tutor get worse. Long story short, his son ends up almost dying when they try to kill the tutor with a leaky gas heater.  Then his wife is smashed by a truck while trying to cover up their attempted murder on the tutor.  It’s all just fucked up for this family who just didn’t want their son accused of looking at child porn.  If the piece of shit tutor would have chilled out for a min everything would have been fine.  So stupid.   

Anyway, back to sci-fi.  Started watching The Peripheral on Amazon Prime and 3 episodes in I’m digging it.  Girl and her brother freelance VR video game experts get hired to test new VR tech from a mysterious company.  Once inside the new reality things get more serious.   Apparently it’s based on a book so now I can’t go onto the reddit to discuss theories without being spoiled by every other asshole being like “in the book this happens”   I’m just gonna enjoy it as it unfolds I guess.  

Severance season 2 has begun filming. I can’t wait for that one!  If you haven’t watched this you need to ASAP.   

OK that’s all.  I’m sure there’s other stuff but this is what’s on my mind right now.  
Getting my 2nd booster later and gonna watch the Weird Al movie.  Happy Friday. Turn your clocks back!