I got back from Ohio last night. My mom had a Remembrance Party in honor of my dad this last weekend. It was a really nice time. I'm glad I got to see so many people that knew my dad and talk to them about how he was a positive and/or great influence in their lives. The party was a bbq party too. My younger brother smoked 30 pounds of pulled pork and 20 pounds of bbq beef. I helped with the process. It was a great time.

My neighbor next door is moving so he had a full house sale over the weekend. I lucked out and bought his snowblower for $150.  Its got some years of use on it, but hes kept it in amazing shape. A new gas one like this is around $800+. I hope it works great this next winter. It could save me all kinds of time shoveling.

My PC came with a free month of Game Pass Ultimate. I decided to check out what I can play for free and found out how garbage the Xbox App for PC is. I downloaded Halo Infinite. The game wouldn't load. It would show the spartan insignia and then I'd just get a black screen. I never got to the title screen. Upon investigating this, its apparently a common issue. I tried all the "fixes" and uninstalled and re-installed the game twice. It never worked. So then I try to play The Ascent with a friend. The game worked fine solo, but we couldn't connection to each other. Again, I look it up and its once again.... a common issue. This time with no fix. We gave up and bought it on steam where it works without any issues. Needless to say, I'm cancelling Game Pass.

I never wanted to try to Souls game. The thought of being one shotted and having to start all over again from a single mistake always turned me off. I don't have as much time as I use to to "git gud". Fallen Order was the closest i ever played to a souls style game, but by the time you got force powers, the game became more like  inFAMOUS games than Souls. I got Elden Ring for whatever reason and honestly... I've been enjoying the hell out of it despite some soul crushing moments. I like the freedom, the exploration, finding good gear laying around without having to fight anything. Gear that will give you a fighting chance to get even better gear. You're not forced to fight any of the bosses in any particular order You can skip bosses to get to most of the world with exception of the last 2 areas. The purpose of beating bosses to to progress the story. So I've played in a way where I've gone to most the world. geared up as high as possible.. allowing me 1 fully upgraded legendary weapon.. and being able to have an easier time with the story bosses... then there are "optional" bosses that are just savage AF and HP sponges. I've beaten a few but some are just beyond my skill level. Either way, I highly recommend this game as a non souls fan. At the very least, its worth your money when it goes on discount sometime down the road.

I haven't been active on the site lately. My dad's health issues became much worse over the last few months and he passed away 10 days ago. I took a couple trips to Ohio during that time and I'm glad I got to spend multiple days with him before he passed. RIP dad. I miss you.