Our good friend Fish recently left the Pacific Northwest and moved to sunny, sunny Florida.

He just sent me an email about his fishing trip (something that I guess people down there do on a Thursday). He included a great shot of his gear and an even better one of a danger sign. It is similar to a sign that I once encountered, but this one could only happen in Florida.



PS. Fish, you might be interested to know that it has been snowing here for the past few days.

To quote the disgruntled Mr Fish:

“They said it could not be done, but 3 bottles of gin and 15 packs of marlbros later i overcame the dark side!! Will miss the game and all the coaching. Thanks to 2 iPhones and 3 grown adults, we beat an 18 year old game!!! Damn I had a great time, next step FF2!!!!”

And there you have it.

In his final hours as an Oregonian, Mr. Fish stayed indoors, mere inches from the enemies that taunted him from the other side of the TV screen. But, in the end he was victorious. He vanquished “Chaos” and basked in the light of the end game screen. Truly, one of the last American heroes!

Yet, the quest is not over

I heard a whisper that Square Soft may have created a sequel….

So, Sam and I are now diving head first into FF2 for the SNES.

Like many of the games developed during the 90’s, there were versions created in Japan that were never released in the USA.Therefore, FF2 for the SNES is actually FF4 when you realize that there was also a FF2 and FF3 released on the NES.

It gets a bit confusing, but we have decided to stick with a geographically referential numbering system. Plus, I am not fluent in Kanji, which might make the alternative games a bit more challenging.

For all the torrid details of the FF numbering system, I recommend watching the Final Fantasy retrospective on YouTube.

Our good friend Fish (aka the “disgruntaled Mr Fish“) is moving to Florida. His girl Linda already made the trip down there and soon enough he will be joining her to live in “America’s Wang”. Before he goes, we have the pleasure of a house guest for a few weeks.

Now he really is a great guy to have as a roomie. But, last week he seemed a bit down. I think he misses Linda. So we pulled out the old Nintendo and he immediately gravitated toward Final Fantasy.

Final Fantasy number 1 – that is.

There have been over a dozen of these games, but this is the original. The highlight of 1990, I literally hadn’t played the game since I was 10. It took a minute to blow the dust out of the cartridge. Afterwards it started right up.

It didn’t take long for Fish to become engrossed in the game play. After watching for an hour, the same can be said for Sam and I. Despite the 8-bit graphics, the game really delivers. It has a fun story, a massive world and an entrancing mono sound track.

The whole thing brings back fond memories of growing up part of the Nintendo generation.

Last weekend, I went with several friends (Sam, Poarch and the disgruntaled Mr. Fish) up to Larch Mountain. Less then 45 minutes outside of Portland, this lush area is just inside of the Mt. Hood national forest. It also happens to be some of the highest elevation around. In winter, the snow falls here first, which makes it a prime place to go snowshoeing.

However, the weather was still good and we weren’t looking for snow – we were looking for mushrooms! (more…)

This is for my good friend Fish (Mike) and his parents.

He asked me to send his mom some photos that I had taken of his dogs. Unfortunately, there were so many good ones that I don’t trust sending them by email – the file size would be too big. So I am posting them here. (more…)