A friend sent me a picture (The previously un-doctored image in Figure 1) of an unusual curbside marking near his work.  I’m not sure what was necessarily meant by the yellow paint on the curb, but the only drivers this will deter from parking in this spot are action figures and chipmunks that can pass a maneuverability test.

For anyone preparing to comment that the Barbie car in the picture is not to scale, save it.  If it were, you wouldn’t be able to see it.  I’ve made quite clear my stance on PhotoShop accusations in the past.

Perhaps this was meant to be a future site of a fire hydrant, lemonade stand, or roadside porta-pottie.  Either way, if you see this keep the throttle full on your big wheel.

Click the picture to enlarge.

Well, I finally got around to it.

I had been sitting at 70% or so complete for trophies on LittleBigPlanet for PlayStation 3, with the only trophies left to achieve being those associated with creating a level.  I had put this off for awhile, picking up other games, figuring this would be a large undertaking consuming days of my time.  I also struggled with the dilemma of what my level should be about.  I didn’t want to just make a level, I wanted to make a good level.

I decided the best way to design a level was to draw it out on paper first.  I began making rough sketches of individual ideas and obstacles, both from my own mind and from my experiences playing the game, and a level began to take shape.  I had already completed all of the level creation tutorials, so I knew what I was getting into, but I was pleasantly surprised with how quickly I was able to create and tweak different things in my level.  I had forgotten how intuitive the system is.  This basically put to rest my theory that this undertaking would take days.

Just over one day after starting, my first level, “Sackboy Skills Training” was published.  I went with a basic level concept with no distinct theme so as to get my feet wet.  Future endeavors in level creation might yield a more imaginative concept.  The level consists of standard grab and swing obstacles, jumping and timing hazards, a times two area, a disappearing bridge, an extremely hazardous cave section, a Paintinator section, and a zipline.  The disappearing bridge is available as a community object encapsulated in the only prize bubble in the level (though there are many score bubbles).

I think for a first level, this didn’t turn out too bad.  I think my next venture will be a survival mode level involving explosives.  After spending a decent amount of time creating something, I would not mind a break to blow some stuff up.

Video after the break.

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Finally, a game where I can get some practice in before the twelve year olds get really good and taunt me from all over the world.

About a week back I received an email from the PlayStation Network asking me to fill out a brief survey, thereby registering me for possible selection for the upcoming MAG private beta test. Here we are, a week later, and I’ve been selected as one of the lucky few (figure 1), beta code sitting in my inbox.  This will be my second beta test on the PlayStation 3, with the first being PlayStation Home.  Let’s hope MAG is a little more worth my time.

If you’re not familiar with MAG, it stands for “Massive Action Game”–major fail in the title department–and is an online shooter designed with a unique server architecture allowing it to support online battles of up to 256 players at once.  Shooters usually fall stale with me as they feel like the same thing over and over, but I am excited to see if MAG can accomplish this feat of scale that we haven’t yet seen in console gaming.  The game supposedly also divides players into 8-player squads, with four squads forming a platoon, and four platoons forming a company.  MAG is scheduled to be released in January 2010.

Click after the break for proof screenshots of the invite and ensuing download.

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A lot of people hate moving, and I’m not excluded from that group.  The most painful thing about moving is by far the move itself, from renting a truck to bribing your friends with sexual favors beer or a free meal to help you move that couch you claim “probably isn’t all that heavy.”  One major annoyance I have with moving is  filing all of the address changes.  When you move, you need to update your credit card companies, subscriptions, frequent customer cards, hot dog of the month club…the list goes on.  I moved recently and had to go through this all over again.

The hardest part of this hell is remembering everything your address is tied to, so I started making a list of everything.  As I moved down the list, I realized some organizations make this process easier than others.  There were actually a couple of places that I literally could not, based on policy, update my address online.  Really.  I’m serious.  I couldn’t update my Wells Fargo credit card’s address online either, but not because of policy.  It’s because their website is complete and utter shit.  Well, it was.  I say that because the shit site I used to sign on to was no longer there.  POOF!!! Gone.  I found another website for Wells Fargo cards–that’s right, they have different sites for each different type of account–but couldn’t get it to accept any of my credentials.  I swallowed my pride and picked up the phone to call customer service…for a credit card company.

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I’ve been exploring different ways to market this blog and gain loyal readers.  I comment on other blogs, utilize social bookmarks, and try to write quality, searchable content.  One thing I had not tried is using social networking.  It seems like this would be one of the first things I would use.  I made the decision early on that I wanted to wait until the blog had matured some before I started mass promotion.  My archive is sizeable, the site is programmatically stable, and I’m finding my voice, so I figured that it had become time to create a Facebook fan page for 2Lincolns.com.

Anyone with a Facebook account can join.  You can go to Facebook and search for “2Lincolns.com”, go directly to the fan page by clicking here, or utilize the Facebook “fan box” you see before the comments section of this post (must be viewing full post to see comments section).

The fan box is located at the end of every post, before the comments section.  On the 2Lincolns.com fan page, you can perform most of the standard Facebook functions and interact with other fans of the page.  In addition, click on the “Blog” tab to become a follower and have posts appear in your Facebook news feed.  Feel free to invite your Facebook friends to join as well.

For the tech saavy, remember that subscribing to the 2Lincolns.com RSS feed has, and always will be, an option.  If you don’t know what an RSS feed is, you’re a few years behind the rest of the class.  Click here to catch up.

However you decide to follow 2Lincolns.com, I appreciate you spending some of your precious internet browsing time here.