Trinchado @ Mesa Portuguesa

It was Trinchado time again Saterday, the 29th of August 2009. This time I went to Mesa Portuguesa in Pretoria to try their take on the Trinchado.

Just the photo alone shows that the Mesa Trinchado is different than the O'Galito Trinchado and the Braza Trinchado.

The Mesa Portuguesa Trinchado was not hot spicey but it was full a flavour spicey, if that makes sense. This time the sauce was a red wine sauce and not a white wine sauce. Mesa also gives a nice Portuguese roll with the Trinchado.

So I would rate the Trinchado 7/10, I prefer the creamy white sauce. So it has the same rating than the Braza Trinchado but the Mesa Trinchado just looks tastier when it gets to the table than the Braza Trinchado.

Dead Space

I played Dead Space almost a year after it was released. The game is really brilliant. I was captivated right up to the end and the ending was quite scary, my heart skipped a beat.

I would definitely play Dead Space 2, the follow up story will be great. I have a lot of unanswered questions around The Marker.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed

So after a very long time of having this game I eventually finished it. The game was fun but it wasn't anything like KOTOR 2. My favourite is still KOTOR 2.

I chose the light side, so the ending was a bit of a let down, but it couldn't be anything else since the game is between episode 3 and episode 4 of Star Wars.

Trinchado @ O'Galito

It was Trinchado time again Sunday, the 2nd of August 2009. This time I went to O'Galito in Centurion to try their take on the Trinchado.

Just the photo alone shows that the O'Galito Trinchado and the Braza Trinchado are different. The O'Galito Trinchado has a nice creamy white wine sauce where the Braza Trinchado did not have the creamy part, only white wine part.

The O'Galito Trinchado was also not spicy, so again a nice chilled out Trinchado. I prefer the Portuguese roll that came with the Braza Trinchado. The O'Galito bread was fresh but the Portuguese roll just enhances the experience.

So I would rate the Trinchado 8/10, the sauce was better than Braza but the bread not.

Cellphone carry bag

I always have a problem when it comes to carrying my cellphone around. I really do not like the cellphone wrappers like the Body Glove products and I also do not want to carry my cellphone in my pocket the whole time. Carrying it around in my pocket is not always comfortable and it limits what pants I can wear.

Now previously I bought myself a digital camera carry bag which could fit both my cellphone and my wallet. I would wear it like a normal carry bag over the shoulder but it looked a bit like a purse. I called it my 'Man Bag' but my wife called it my 'Man Purse'!

When it came to getting a new cellphone I decided to look around for something different this time to carry the cellphone in. I discovered this nice little digital camera carry bag from Golla. Thank goodness the digital cameras became smaller over the last few years, now my cellphone fits snugly inside the carry bag and it has a little space for my credit card and driver's license.

So now I do not need to carry my wallet with me the whole time and the carry bag is small enough not to look like a 'Man Purse' any more. Now it just looks like a Leatherman hanging from my belt.

The Goonies

A childhood favourite movie of mine, The Goonies. At long last my favourite online shop Take2 had stock and I ordered it. So now I only need to make time to watch it again. Will need some popcorn and a soda for this classic.

PS2 to PS3 converter

Since I am a PlayStation fanboy, I obviously had two PS2 game controllers, so when I bought the PS3 I decided not to spent more money on another PS3 controller. Instead I bought this PS2 to PS3 converter.

You plug the PS2 controller into the one side and the converter's USB plug into the PS3's USB port and that is it. Works like a charm, no setup procedure necessary.

So now I can play 2 player Bionic Commando ReArmed and soon Street Fighter IV or Soul Calibre IV.

Now all I need is a nice Fightstick, but it seems everybody is still out of stock.

PS3 Remote Control

After using the PS3 controller for a long while to watch movies, I decided to buy the PS3 remote control. The PS3 remote control is also more intuitive to people like my wife who is used to something like a DVD remote control.

The remote was not too expensive and it works via Bluetooth so there is no need to point the remote in the direction of the PS3 like with normal IR remote controls.

The form factor also helps a great deal. Game controllers aren't designed to be used as DVD remote controls.

Trinchado @ Braza

I am a big Trinchado fan, so I order it almost always as a starter when and if the restaurant has it. What I did find is that every restaurant makes Trinchado different.

I decided that I will take a photo of the different Trinchado that I come across and blog something about it. First up is the Trinchado @ Braza in Menlyn Park.

First off the bread that comes with the Trinchado was a standard Portuguese roll, so nothing fancy but it was fresh and very soft. So a very nice Portuguese roll.

The Trinchado itself was also very nice. It was not hot at all. The Trinchado is made from little squares of beef in a nice white wine sauce, so nothing hot. If you are in the mood for a nice chilled out Trinchado I would say the Braza Trinchado is the way to go, if you want something more spicy this is not the Trinchado for that specific day then.

So I would rate the Trinchado 7/10, very enjoyable.

Killzone 2

I rented Killzone 2 the other day but I just realised again that I am not a pure FPS fan at all. I loved Bioshock which was from a first person angle but it had a compelling story. Killzone 2 on the other hand has no story to it other than the normal thin FPS back story.

So I played it a few hours but I am now so bored with it that I am going to swop it out as soon as I go past the store again. Hopefully they have the new Wolverine game available.

Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles

I hate watching a TV series and there are two reasons for this. The one is that the series might suck and if it is based on a movie then it just ruins the movie. The other is the series might be great but they run out of budget and you are left in limbo.

Thankfully TSCC is in the second category. I just finished watching the 2nd season and it was brilliant. The last five episodes or so with the new added twist really makes the whole Terminator universe grow.

The story was so good that I am scared to go and watch T4 in a few months time because that movie might miss the whole universe and what it is about and just focus on the action turning it into just one big dumb action movie which would be sad.

I really hope they continue with TSCC because I hate being left in limbo and if they do not make season 3 then I will have the same feeling that I had with some other shows that were just stopped.

BSG was great in the sense that they decided end of season 4 will be the end, so they gave a good ending that brought closure and that is what I hope TSCC will do as well. I am a big Smallville fan but I am really thinking they are pushing the limits, 8 seasons and no ending in sight, I would hate it if Smallville had no ending and is just canned.

So on the whole TSCC season 2 was very good and I feel it really made the Terminator universe grow a bit more from the the standard Terminator wants to kill John, they run and run and run, kill Terminator, the end.

Wolverine

I had no idea Gavin Hood was directing Wolverine. Now this is one of those rare South Africans that really made something for himself out of nothing. Much like Charlize, not a big fan of her, but I have respect for what she accomplished.

So hopefully Wolverine does very well, I will be one of the people going to watch it on opening weekend.

Toshiba Portege G710

I recently decided that Vodacom is over charging me, so I downgraded my contract and opted not to take a cell phone at all. I'd rather use my current Palm 750 until it dies, if that happens I have my eye on this little smartphone from Toshiba. It is not full of features as the Treo 750 but I found that I rarely use those features, so for the price this smartphone is on the money.

Tekken 5

I am a big Tekken fan. I lost out on the Tekken 5 for PS2 but luckily they made a Tekken 5 for PS3 with online play.

I even downloaded it with South Africa's crippled broadband.

I am really impressed with this game. The Online play is brilliant, even with my slow internet connection.

All I need now is a FightStick but they are all out of stock because SFIV was released the other day and the whole US wanted to buy FightSticks.

Tomb Raider Underworld

I always loved the Tomb Raider series, even in the dark days when the critics seemed to hate it.

Tomb Raider has been developed by a new company for the last 3 releases and they are doing a good job.

The latest release Underworld was really good, was old school Tomb Raider, but it seems I am in the minority when compared to newer games like Drake's Fortune.

I still need to play Drake's Fortune and maybe then too I will not be satisfied with Tomb Raider anymore, but I doubt it.

Assassin's Creed

I finished Assassin's Creed on the PS3 yesterday.

The game was very good. I liked the story line but the missions could get a bit repetitive at times.

The Informant missions was dumb as hell, didn't like them much.

The fighting engine was especially good.

Bioshock

I finished Bioshock for PS3. Took me a few days but being on leave I can play almost 8 hours a day now.

The game was really good. The story was very rich and I haven't had this much fun playing a game since Fallout 3.

So a game worthwhile investing my time.

My Playstation 3

I have been wanting to buy a PS3 for a while now, but I never got to it. I bought one today and I am very happy with it. Already I am streaming my media (movies, videos and photos) over the LAN to the PS3 to display on my new LCD TV.

I have no games yet and with South Africa's horrible broadband costs I also can't download any games. So Take2 will be my next stop for some games and maybe a Blu-Ray movie.

It seems to have been a worthwhile investment. No more ugly PC's in my living room.

I am a dad at last.

Alexis was born today. 2.85kg and 45cm tall.

Geat stuff.

Sinotec 42" Full HD LCD

My 84cm CRT TV broke for the second time, so I decided to buy the Sinotec 42" LCD TV.

Works amazing sofar. It even has a D-Sub input and can do 1360x768, so 720p movies on my hard disk can be displayed at great detail.

Video streaming wirelessly 2

Ok so I invested in the Ellies wireless AV sender / receiver. So far it works great. Only problems so far is when a heavy Thunderstorm is raging, the signal is very weak then, but other than that is seems to work great.

So now I can record my DSTV shows without the need for my PC in my living room.

Pinnacle Studio

So I tried a few things to get Pinnacle to record my shows in MPEG2 correctly but I failed. Now I just record the shows in DV quality and the use VirtualDub afterwards to encode it into DivX format. So no more sound sync problems and DivX is supported by most hardware these days anyway.

DarkStar One Cheat

I started playing DarkStar One and it is a very nice game but the level system sucks. You have to collect stupid crystals and that becomes boring very quickly.

So I used Artmoney to find the memory addresses for money and the crystals. So now I can set the crystal count, collect one more crystal and then levelling is all sorted.

The downside is the higher the ship level the more difficult the enemies become, but that is fine, I like the fighting part it was just the mundane crystal hunting I didn't like. So I added these 2 cheats in the .amt file.

Artmoney

I found a new way of cheating in my games. Some games are just so boring or mundane that cheating is the only way to enhance the experience. Low level cheating of course, just that little extra to take the boring out of it. This usually boils down to cheating with money. I found this nice tool to help. It is called Artmoney and works well.