fjetsam.com

• 01/05 – New Nintendo Box Art Hits Web
• 01/04 – The BBPS Fat Kids Challenge
• 01/04 – Luke Smith is pissed
• 01/03 – Time Magazine’s 25 Top 10 Lists 2006
• 01/03 – Oh, people can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. Forty percent of people know that.
• 01/03 – Statistically speaking, the PSP has a better library than the DS
• 01/03 – Hudson finally puts our concerns to rest
• 01/03 – Katamari Damacy NOT coming to XBLA
• 01/02 – Ubisoft Oopsies – Bad box info on Splinter Cell: Double Agent
• 01/02 – Hudson: The Redemption
• 01/01 – A Suitcase Full of Memories
• 01/01 – Watching movies on a Wii?
• 01/01 – Preview 360 Themes Online
• 01/01 -Official Response WILL be coming from Hudson on the 800 point R-Type release
• 01/01 – What happened to Dungeon Explorer
• 01/01 – In the Year 2000: You’ll be nicer to me on Live, because I’ll know where you live
• 12/31 – Free New Year’s Events in Canada
• 12/30 – Five Inventions You Didn’t Know Were Canadian
• 12/30 – Otaku Envy: SimCity DS in Japan
• 12/30 – DirtyDiva’s Flickr Faceplates
• 12/29 – Wiinterbells

I’ve also spent a lot of my week getting some behind the scenes work done with bbps.  I’ll keep hush hush on some of that because it’s not really my place to broadcast their business, but I’ll just say that it’s kept me on my toes.

The calm side of things?  That’d be the posts.  Between all of the above and, of course, the holidays, my posting duties have been a little light this week.  Here’s the rundown;

• 12/27 – NoBullet on Conan!
• 12/27 – Year in Review – 2006 according to jimmycanuck
• 12/27 – 35 Most Outrageous Fees (and how to avoid them)
• 12/27 – The North American House Hippo
• 12/24 – Last Minute Shopping Ideas – 1 Day to Go!
• 12/23 – Great Canadian Deals – Boxing Week 360′s
• 12/23 – Watch Arrested Development Free, Courtesy of MSN
• 12/23 – Boxing Week Canada: Xbox 360′s for $399
• 12/23 – Last Minute Shopping Ideas – 2 Days to Go!
• 12/22 – Last Minute Shopping Ideas – 3 Days to Go!
• 12/21 – And so it begins… R-Type for the TG-16, 800 points.
• 12/21 – Xbox Live Canada: Multiplayer Mayhem Month
• 12/21 – Last Minute Shopping Ideas – 4 Days to Go!

Things kicked off with an interview with Elliot Hanson, a modder who is recreating New York City brick for brick in SimCity 4.  A few days later I posted my second entry in my new weekly column In The Year 2000 — this week it was all about the trojan horse that is Xbox Live.  After that I began my week long series Last Minute Shopping Ideas over at SmartCanucks which as kept me pretty busy.  The week wasn’t all about editorial content, though.  I found myself breaking not one, but two stories on our dear old interweb.  I was the first blogger to bring the broken nature of Military Madness to light, and after speaking with my PR pal over at Telltale Games I was the first to bring info of possible Mac and Live Arcade version of the new Sam and Max games to the masses.  I also had time to throw a couple of reviews into the mix -Assault Heroess on Xbox Live Arcade and the new Sam and Max game for the PC, Situation Comedy.  Reviewing Assault Heroes was no big deal, but Situation Comedy marked apretty big milestone for me.  It’s the first game that I’ve reviewed before its release.  Snazzy, huh?  I’ve never had to sit on a review until an embargo was lifted, but I’ve got to admit, it’s a pretty nice feeling.

So yeah, all in all, a pretty good week.  :) 

Here’s the complete rundown;

• 12/20 – Rejected Wii Games
• 12/20 – Last Minute Shopping Ideas – 5 Days to Go!
• 12/20 – A BBPS Exclusive – Sam and Mac?
• 12/20 – Sam and Max: Situation Comedy, Reviewed
• 12/19 – Google Zeitgeist – The Years Top Searches
• 12/19 – Last Minute Shopping Ideas – 6 Days to Go!
• 12/19 – 360 Anuncio esta Muy Loco!
• 12/19 – Military Madness – Broken?
• 12/18 – Last Minute Shopping Ideas – 7 Days to Go!
• 12/18 – Hate iTunes? Want an iPod Anyways? Try Dopisp!
• 12/18 – …but is it worth getting on t Virtual Console?
• 12/18 – In The Year 2000: Direct Downloads will be the death of us all
• 12/17 – Revenge of the 1991′s; Assault Heroes Reviewed
• 12/15 – Stay Warm, Save Money
• 12/15 – Speaking Simlish in NYC – An Interview with Elliot Hanson
• 12/14 – Mercury Melting Down to Wii’s in Spring 2007
• 12/14 – Military Madness coming ot Virtual Console on Monday

Oh – and I read the best post the other day about being a better blogger, so I thought I should share..

Every Thursday morning I will bring to you, the flotsam/jetsam nation, a recap of the past weeks events.  This means news of relaunch progress here at f/j, news of my life as a blogger outside of these walls, and links to all of the writing I’ve done in the past week.  This first post will be a little link heavy because I’ll be linking to everything in the past week as well as highlights of what I’ve done since shutting down f/j.  I guess that’s what I get for not coming up with this idea earler.

Ok – two big bits of news for this week; 

News #1 – Not only am I writing for thebbps.com, but I’m pleased as punch to announce that I’ve also joined the writing staff over at SmartCanucks.ca!  It’s my first paying gig, so I think we can safely say that I’m jumped from the realm of amateur to professional blogger.  Very exciting stuff!

News #2 – We’ve had a good friend of the site volunteer to take over the tech-related site admin duties for the relaunch.  This week he and I will begin the long and arduous project of giving the site a fresh new look.  Unfortunately as we’ve come to realize that the site might need a fresh new name too.  Just about every “flotsamjetsam” domain worth having (com/org/net) has been taken.  Still, I won’t abandon the f/j title until we find something better.  If you have any suggestions, feel free to email me.  If we use it, we’ll make sure to recognize your contribution in our inaugural post after the relaunch.  Also – we’re still looking for some writers to join the fold (and will probably be looking to do so ongoing basis) so if you think you’d be a good fit, get in touch with me with a link to your blog or a sample of your writing and we’ll see what we can do.

This Week’s Posts

• 12/13 – FDA finds Nestle Good Start Infant Formula lacks required nutritional value
• 12/13 – Look what the cat dragged in… (jimmycanuck joins the SmartCanucks team!)
• 12/13 – Reviewing Robotnik: Facing the Mean bean Machine
• 12/13 – Toe Jam & Earl/Space Harrier II on the VC dated!
• 12/13 – Put a Wii under the tree for only… $747.75?!?!!?!
• 12/13 – Upcoming Xbox 360 Backwards Compatibility Update Leaked!
• 12/12 – Man plays Wii on 1.5 inch dollhouse TV
• 12/11 – Alien Crush, Reviewed
• 12/11 – In The Year 2000: Wishing for Wii Sports 2
• 12/10 – PS2 Not Dead yet: EA Announces Burnout Dominator
• 12/10 – Bone, Act 1 & 2 – Director’s Cut now available
• 12/08 – Looks like we missed one – Military Madness also coming to Wii!
• 12/08 – A BBPS Exclusive: Two New TG16 VC Games Confirmed
• 12/07 – The World Map Game

Earlier Post Highlights

• 12/05 – Wii Safety Manual: The Missing Pages
• 12/05 – Made entirely from the front teeth of Flava Flav…
• 12/03 – Somebody got Pitfall in my Ultimate Alliance!
• 12/03 – Mega Man vs. Donkey Kong
• 12/02 – Four games coming to Virtual Console this Monday, NES games still slightly cheaer than insulin.
• 12/01 – Whatever Happened to VelocityGirl?
• 11/29 – Interview with an Artist: The Gaming Works of NoBullet
• 11/27 – Hey Nintendo, Isn’t it Monday?
• 11/25 – Xbox Live Vision Camera: Taking the work out of Mii
• 11/22 – A Year of Disappointment, Canadian Style

It’s been pretty quite around here lately, eh?  Sorry about that.  I’ve been busy, but that’s no excuse.  The truth of the matter is, I’ve spent the past week or so figuring out exactly what should be done with flotsam/jetsam.  I love writing this blog, and as near as I can tell, a lot of you enjoy reading it.  Unfortunately adding my duties over at bitsbytespixelssprites.com to my list of daily responsibilities means something had to be pushed out to make room, and as much as I didn’t want it to, it became f/j.  So like I said, I’ve been thinking about what the best course of action might be.  The easy thing to do would be to walk away, but despite my previous blogging efforts, that’s not my style anymore.  Rather than scrap f/j all together and focus on the other parts of my bloggerly life, I’ve decided it’s time for this place to have a makeover.  A major makeover.  As such, you won’t be hearing much from me over the next few months.  Sorry about that people.  My goal is to have everything up and running in the spring.  But what could possibly take that long to put together?  What will all of these changes be?

• - we’ll be getting an actual domain
• - we’ll be doing a complete visual overhaul – something original, not some template wordpress.com forced upon me.
• - we’ll actually become a “we” – rather than being a blog written, managed, and mauled entirely by yours truly, I’ll be assembling a  team of like-minded miscreants over the next few weeks to help me bringf f/j into the 2007′s.
• - we’ll be laying the groundwork for features that we’ll bring about in late 2007 – specifially podcasting and forums.

Now here’s where you come in.  I can’t do all of this alone.  I’m going to need an experienced Site Administrator.  I’m going to need someone who can give the site an original visual polish.  I’m going to need an artist who can work with that person.  I’m going to need writers.  Lots of writers.  Myself included, I’m going to be looking for 5 regular contributors, and as many quality guest bloggers who can pop in once a week as I can find.  Going forward, flotsam/jetsam is going to be a community effort.  If there’s anything you feel you’d like to help out with, any role you’d like to fill, send me an email and we’ll discuss it.

Even though the spitshine is different, the shoes will still be the same.  You can expect the same kind of pop culture oddities, irreverant humour, and nonsensical ramblings you’ve come to expect from flotsam/jetsam.  The only difference is you’ll be getting more of all of them. 

Thanks to everyone out there for making this one of the fastest growing on wordpress.com.   It’s going to be a quiet winter around here, but bundle up tight and I’m sure we’ll all pull through.  Here’s to hoping that the next time you hear from me, it’ll be with a new URL all our own.

• Your Mom’s Box,
• Jim Squires (aka jimmycanuck)

I came across this on the forums at SmartCanucks and I just had to share;

“Dear Tide:
I am writing to say what an excellent product you have! I’ve used it all of my married life, as my Mom always told me it was the best.
Now that I am in my fifties I find it even better! In fact, about a month ago, I spilled some red wine on my new white blouse. My inconsiderate and uncaring husband started to belittle me about how clumsy I was, and generally started becoming a pain in the neck. One thing led to another and somehow I ended up with his blood on my new white blouse! I grabbed my bottle of Tide with bleach alternative, and to my surprise and satisfaction, all of the stains came out! In fact, the stains came out so well the detectives who came by yesterday told me that the DNA tests on my blouse were negative and then my attorney called and said that I was no longer considered a suspect in the disappearance of my husband.
What a relief! Going through menopause is bad enough without being a murder suspect! I thank you, once again, for having a great product.
Well, gotta go, have to write to the Hefty bag people. “

I know – it’s the same sort of crap that I’d normally give people shit for spamming my inbox with, but for some ungodly reason this one just tickled my funny bone.

TRON is one of those things in life that makes me yell “FUCK YES.” I’ve seen the movie countless times, and I’m even proud to admit that I beat the shit out of TRON 2.0 a few years back (hands down, the most underrated game ever.) That’s why, when I stumbled across this ad for the new Honda Civic, I immediately knew I needed to by a new car. See? Marketing directly to the car-less sociopath with a lightcycle fetish TOTALLY pays off.

Interesting sidenote – did you know that Wendy Carlos, the composer who brilliantly scored the movie, was born Walter Carlos? I guess he swapped one baton for another. Ba-dum bum.

Jenifesto here… wow, I have no idea where Jimmy Canuck is, and I was super busy yesterday as well. Just so you know we haven’t jumped ship, participated in a mass suicide, or run away and joined the circus (although that *is* tempting), here’s a little wayback playback for y’all. I’m of that age where the Mac Tonight commercial is a memory but very ill-defined. Part of the ill definition is that I thought it was a cartoon, not a horrendously scary man with a GIANT moon head on. Shudder. Anyways, enjoy!

Danzuke, leader of the gang over at bbps, just posted a really nice welcome message in the comments of my very first post.  Always one to love patting myself on the back, I thought I’d share it here;

“I’m going to take a moment and welcome Jimmy here to the fold. Our 1st add-on writer! He writes some kick ass stuff over on his site and we’re lucky and happy to have him here. He’s from Canada, which I would guess about 60% of Americans could find on a map.

When he’s not writing for us jimmy enjoys national health care and a populace that generally doesn’t shoot at each other. Great White North indeed. “

See?  Everybody loves me.  Take that, Mom and Dad!