Posts

Resident Evil 1 (1996 Video Game)

 With it being 30 years of Resident Evil, I thought I take a look back, all the way to the year of 1996 when a video game company Capcom introduced the world to this survival horror game on the original Playstation. Set in the fictional mountain region in the Midwest, players get to choose between either Chris Redfield or Jill Valentine, who are members of a elite task force known as S.T.A.R.S. and they must escape from a mansion that has been infested with zombie and other monsters. Many gamers nowadays would probably think this is funny, but at the time, the original Resident Evil was given high praise for its graphic, gameplay, sound and atmosphere. But hey, it was 1996, this was a big step for gaming at that point. At the time, it was the highest selling Playstation game of all time which ultimately it was Gran Turismo who became the all time selling game for the original Playstation with Final Fantasy 7 coming in second place. In fact, Resident Evil grossed 200,000,000 dollars...
Post a Comment
Read more

Bedtime Blues (Poem)

 Why must I go through another night laying in tears. It has though everything I feared has surrounded me and those I hold dear. What good am I anyway? So many times I've asked God this question every time I pray. No answer seems to be given, all hope has gone astray. I am such a failure, can't you hear my cries. I'm so ashamed, that I can't even looked into my niece and nephew's eyes. God I pray they never have to feel the way I feel. Please protect them Lord and show them that, no matter what, love is real. I've tried my best to be the man and search for love and happiness, but each time these women just me as someone they just past on through. It was like they were telling me, we never loved you. With each passing day, I only get reminders of why I fail. The older I get, just only reminds me how much more my body is frail. Any kind of happiness has set sail. Let me close my eyes and escape reality. Just let me lay to rest and hear the sounds of raindrops put ...
1 comment
Read more

Phantom Of The Opera (1986 Broadway)

 Holy Cow! I can not believe that this musical masterpiece is 40 years old this year. Last year, I wrote a blog post about the Phantom of the Opera which was a book written by Gaston Leroux over 100 years ago. But then, in 1986, the world was introduced to the musical adaptation of the great story thanks to the efforts of Andrew Lloyd Webber who created the music along with lyricists Charles Hart and Richard Stilgoe. Stilgoe along with Lloyd Webber also did the libretto and follows the plot from the book where singer Christine Daae, who becomes the obsession of a mysterious and disfigured musical genius aka the Phantom of the Opera who lives in a labyrinth beneath the Paris Opera house. The musical made its debut again back in 1986 at the West End theatre in London and from there onward left a legacy like no other. Winning numerous awards, gross billions of dollars worldwide, is the longest running opera show in history and has been seen by 100s of millions of people in multiple co...
1 comment
Read more

Digimon Cyber Sleuth (Being Positive)

 Finally! It took me long enough lol, but I managed to beat a video game called Digimon Cyber Sleuth. I know that it isn't anything too special, but with that being said, I just excited because I have been feeling pretty depressed and frustrated lately and I am trying to be positive. Sorry for that little side note, but after winning the game, I realized that this game is over 10 years old now. Digimon Cyber Sleuth was released on PS4 back in 2015 by Bandai Namco Entertainment. Cyber Sleuth is a third person role playing game where you and your allies have the ability to command Digimon. Digital creatures with their own set of skills who do battle against Digimon. You get to choose between Palmon, Terriermon or Hagurumon as your starting partner at the beginning of the game. Me personally, I choose Hagurumon mainly because I love the whole robotic design of him. Honestly though, I have always been a fan of Patamon. There are over 200 different Digimon that are featured in the game ...
2 comments
Read more

The Wacky Adventures Of Josh And Chad: Trimble The McVeytown Goose!

 Despite all of the rain, my twin brother Chad and I headed our way down to McVeytown and witness the debut of the McVeytown Goose at the Rothrock library. This special event was thanks to the Community Partnerships Wild Geese Flock. Together, public art project which recognizes our region's Goose Day traditions. The unveiling of the McVeytown Goose was pretty cool to see and we got to hangout with some of our friends at the Rothrock library. Seeing the finishing touches of the Goose which was created by artist Carley Mattern of Ryde was amazing. Shout Out to Carley, the goose looks awesome! In fact, the goose was given the name Trimble. For those who do not know, the name was inspired by Dr. Joseph T. Rothrock who is from McVeytown and was known as the Father of Forestry. The T which is the first of his middle, Trimble and that is why the goose is named that as a tribute to him. Presenting Trimble the McVeytown Goose was Anne Fisher-Henson who also helped with sponsoring for the g...
2 comments
Read more

Fight Night Round 3

 One of my personal favorite sports to watch growing up as a youngster, was the great sport of boxing. And some of my favorite video games to play were boxing games. Today is one such game that I will be blogging about and honestly, it just might be the greatest boxing video game of all time in my humble opinion. It is called Fight Night Round 3! Fight Night Round 3 was the third installment of the Fight Night series which were created by Electronic Arts and their EA Sports division back in 2006. The game features 27 real life boxers, including two of my personal favorite fighters Arturo Gatti and Micky Ward who were also on the cover of the game on the sixth generation consoles. Other fighters Oscar De La Hoya, Evander Holyfield, Mike Tyson, etc. The gameplay was fun and I love the different styles of boxing you can make your created boxer to have as well as different ways of blocking. The career mode was a lot of fun too! Getting to create myself or just make up a random characte...
2 comments
Read more

Conan O'Brien

 With my quest of trying to be more positive and getting away from negative thoughts, I thought I write about someone who has been quite an inspiration to me in my life. His name is Conan O'Brien. For those of you who may not know, Conan is an American television host, comedian and writer. He is best known for his late night talk shows that began all the way back to 1993 when he debut on NBC with Late Night with Conan O'Brien. The first time I got to see Conan was during the late 90s when he was the host of Late Night with Conan O'Brien. Being a young kid at that time, getting to see the show was always fun, especially since it was just me and my twin brother Chad and our older brother Cody. Of course this was also before I realized that Late Night was a nightly show lol. For a long time, I thought the show only happened on Friday night. Me and Chad would basically crawl from our room over to Cody's room and we just chill and watch Conan together. Personally, I always g...
1 comment
Read more

An Eye For An Eye (Chuck Norris Film)

 The Chuck Norris movies continue as once again, my twin and I got to jump on Tubi and today we saw one of my personal favorite Chuck Norris film, An Eye for An Eye which is 45 years old now as it came out in 1981. The film was directed by Steve Carver and it stars Chuck Norris (Of Course 😁) as Sean Kane who is out for revenge against a drug cartel who killed his partner after being betrayed by an informant.  After quitting the force, Kane seeks out his friend Linda Chan, played by Roselind Chao the girlfriend of his partner who was killed. She too seeks to bring down the gang only to be killed herself by the gang which leads Kane down a dark path of lies and betrayals. Once again, this is one of my favorite Chuck Norris movie. For one, the really enjoyed the cast that this movie has assembled. Along with Norris, they also had Richard Roundtree (RIP) who many people remember him as John Shaft of the Shaft movies. Matt Clark (RIP) who had been in movies like Josey Wales, Outla...
1 comment
Read more

Rocky (1976 Movie)

 One of my personal favorite movies ever is now turning 50 years old this year. One of my personal heroes and inspirations for daily life and that is the Italian Stallion himself, Rocky. In 1976, the world was introduced to Rocky Balboa, a down on his luck boxer trying to overcome the obstacles in his life. Sylvester Stallone stars as Rocky as well as the creator which basically launched Stallone into stardom. Story follows Balboa who is struggling in the city of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia, Pa as a boxer and loan shark collector for the local mob. He soon gets the break he was hoping for when the World Heavyweight Champion Apollo Creed was looking for new opponent to face him since his previous challenger had to back out of the fight due to a broken hand. Creed decides to give Rocky a shot at the title. The fight itself turned into a frenzy as Rocky proves himself more than a challenge for the champion Creed. Although Creed would win the fight via decision, Rocky managed to go th...
2 comments
Read more

Ten Commandments (1956 Film)

 This past weekend, many of us here were at home with our loved ones and celebrated Easter. And one of the things that we do around the house was watch the Ten Commandments movie which this marks its 70th anniversary. This film first came out in 1956 and has a length of 220 minutes which basically means that this film is four hours long 😮. Ten Commandments was directed by Cecil B. DeMille which this film ended up being his last movie before his passing in 1959 (Rest In Peace). The movie follows the life of Moses through the Book Of Exodus from the Bible along with other sources. Such as the novel Prince of Egypt by Dorothy Clarke Wilson, J.H. Ingraham's Pillar of Fire and On Eagle's Wings by A.E. Southon. At the time of its release to the public, the Ten Commandments movie was the most expensive movie ever to be made which was a 13 million dollars budget. In fact, it was one of the most successful films ever grossing a grand total of 122.7 million dollars in its initial releas...
Post a Comment
Read more

Depressed But Hopeful

 With it being Easter today, many people will be celebrating by looking for Easter eggs with their love ones. Me, I will be dealing with more depression.  It has been a little while since I have written anything on my blog, mainly because of my current battle with my mental health. I am just laying here frustrated with myself and honestly, it has taken me away from the things I love like my writing. Things in my life haven't been going well, been struggling with my work, my head is filled with some many different thoughts and I am just not really sure what to think and more so, I am not even sure if I am making any sense. I have tried to talk to some people about this, but all it seems to come up in my head is just jibber-jabber. It was making me feel insane. Yet, at the same time, I have been feeling more hopeful, especially more recently. Why is that? How could I possibly feel hopeful and sad at the exact same time? I can only guess that God is watching over me. It just feel...
2 comments
Read more

The Hitman (Chuck Norris Movie)

 With the unfortunate death of the great Chuck Norris, Chad and I have been on a Chuck Norris kick and we have been reliving some of his great movies. Today's film was the 1991 classic called the Hitman. The Hitman is a Canadian-American action that again stars the late, great Chuck Norris as well as directed by his brother Aaron Norris and written by Don Carmody, Robert Geoffrion and Galen Thompson. This movie was also distributed by the now defunct company called Cannon Pictures. The story follows Seattle cop Cliff Garret (Chuck Norris) who was severely wounded during a drug bust gone awry after being betrayed by his corrupt partner Ronny "Del" Delany. He soon awakened and was given a brand new identity and Garret becomes a "Hitman" for Mob Boss Marco Luganni. But soon, Garret discovers his old partner is around and it becomes a personal vendetta. The Hitman was considered as a box office success when it originally came out to the masses and watching the movie...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Original Xbox

 WOW! Just WOW! This year along has about big time milestones, especially in my lifetime. One of those special milestone is celebrating 25 years since the debut of one of the biggest video game consoles ever, the original Xbox. Amazing! 25 years ago back in 2001, the original Xbox literally burst upon the scene. For the time since 1993, with the Atari Jaguar, that a American-produced console was created. The Xbox was created by Microsoft and was a response to the launching of Sony's Playstation 2 and Nintendo's GameCube. The first time that I myself got to see the Xbox was during an episode of GameSpot TV on ZDTV/Tech TV. Being a kid at the time, I was just excited to see more video games to play, I never was into the whole "Console Wars". Sure, I had my favorites just like everyone else, but I just loved video games. But going back to GameSpot TV, I found an old episode on YouTube and just brought a smile on my face. I had forgotten how much of a big deal it was at t...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Wacky Adventures Of Josh And Chad: McVeytown Fire Company 18

 Sometimes the most adventurous days come when you do not expect them and today was certainly one of those days. Chad and I went outside to take care of recycling and Chad had suggested we go check out the brand new Fire House for the McVeytown Fire company.  His boss from Kountry Kitchen, Amanda Boozel, her husband Doug is the Assistant Chief of the McVeytown Fire Company and they invited us to come over and check out the new the building. Of course we decided to go and see it for ourselves. When we arrived, Doug was not there yet, but we were welcomed by Nate Moist and many other members of the fire company and Moist went and gave us a little tour around the building. It was quite beautiful and I am glad to see that they were able to get the building put up. Now, remember when I said that sometimes the adventure can come when you least expect it. Well that came as we had just finished up our little tour, the alarm went off as a fire had broken out.  While Chad and I sto...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Wacky Adventures Of Josh And Chad: HWF Wrestling: That Night At The Garden!

 Well, after a bit of a break, my twin brother Chad and I went back onto the road again and got to meet up with our friends of the Honorary Wrestling Federation over at the Heritage Fire Company in Lewistown Pa for their That Night At The Garden show. As always we went down there to see friends and cover the event for my friend and mentor Kenny Varner and Hometown Sports Magazine. This event was special to me because for the first time in the history HWF, there was going to be a royal rumble type of match at their show. That is correct, an indy wrestling show was going to have a 30 wrestler royal rumble match at their show. I was excited, yet nervous at the same time because I was worried and honestly hoping and praying that things were going to go smoothly. It is not easy to pull off that kind of match at a small time Indy promotion, but with that being said, I thought they did an amazing job. A lot of the newcomers got their chance to shine and have a their first match in front o...
Post a Comment
Read more

BB King (Blues Singer)

 Being a fan of the blues in large part due to amazing musicians like Eric Clapton for example as well as the Blues Brothers. But being a bit of a history buff myself, I wanted to learn about the history of the blues and that is the subject of today's blog post. I write about the "The King of the Blues" Riley B. King, better known as B.B. King. Now I must say again, the first time I was introduced to B.B. King was thanks to Eric Clapton and the Blues Brothers as well as seeing him play at a Les Paul tribute concert. Just watching him sitting there with his pretty sweet bowtie and just absolutely shred his guitar completely blew my mind. I thought to myself, who is this guy? Since then I have been researching King and I got to learn some incredible stuff. For one, prior to his death in 2015 😢, King started his career long before even my parents were born. King was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987. King was given a Grammy L...
Post a Comment
Read more

Gatti Versus Ward 1

 If you had read a couple of my previous blog posts, I had written about two of my favorite boxers/fighters of all-time in the form "Irish" Micky Ward and Arturo "Thunder" Gatti. Their legendary trilogy of boxing matches are one of, if not the greatest trilogy of fights in the history of the sport of boxing. One of the craziest things that I have noticed was the simple fact of all three of their fights were within a two year period. With the first fight, which is what I am writing about today, was fought on May 18 2002 at the Mohegan Sun in Connecticut. It was a boxing bout at 142 pounds aka Super-Lightweight and it was set to go ten rounds. I mean, let's be honest with ourselves folks, no one could have ever predicted how special of a night this match was going to be. From the opening round all the way to the final bell of round ten, both Gatti and Ward left everything in the ring. Honestly, with that being said, I do not think I can even find the words do it t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Resident Evil (Video Game Series)

 With the recent release of the newest entree of Resident Evil Requiem, I wanted to take a little look back at one of the greatest franchises in video game history. Resident Evil! It is amazing to me to think that this series is 30 years old this year and it is still going strong. The original Resident Evil game came out in 1996 on the original Playstation. It was created by gaming company Capcom thanks to the efforts of Shinji Mikami and Tokuro Fujiwara. Resident Evil typically consist of survival horror, third-person shooters and first-person elements while avoiding zombies or other mutant creatures.  This game is among one of the highest grossing horror franchises of all time as well as being Capcom's biggest franchise selling nearly 200 million dollars worldwide. If fact, two of the characters throughout its run, Leon S. Kennedy and Albert Wesker have both been named as some of the greatest video game characters of all time. Although I have been around Resident Evil since ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Arturo "Thunder" Gatti Tribute

 Alittle bit ago, I had written about one of my favorite boxers ever in "Irish" Micky Ward. Well today, I figure that I would write about another famous boxer who sadly is no longer with us and is Arturo "Thunder" Gatti. The second half of this amazing trilogy of boxing matches along with Ward, Gatti was such an incredible fighter who competed from 1991 to 2007. Gatti held a World title in two different weight classes, the first being the IBF junior lightweight championship from 1995 to 1998 and the WBC super lightweight title from 2004 to 2005. Thunder scored four Fight of the Night Awards from The Ring Magazine in 1997, 1998, 2002 and 2003 before eventually retiring in 2007. Gatti was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2012 in his first year of eligibility. Arturo fought in a grand total of 49 fights in his professional career winning 40 matches (31 by way of knockout) to go along with nine losses. He was called Thunder for a very good reason a...
Post a Comment
Read more

AJ Styles

 Well if anyone hadn't gotten a chance to see Monday Night Raw this past Monday, it was revealed that the Phenomenal AJ Styles will be inducted into the 2026 WWE Hall Of Fame. Now there is no doubt in anyone's mind that AJ is certainly deserving of this honor. AJ is not only a Hall Of Fame wrestler, but also a Hall Of Fame human being as well. Styles has been one of my favorite in today's era ever since I first saw back in his days with TNA back in the mid-2000s. They called him the Phenomenal One and I totally could see why, it didn't take me very long to become of fan of such an incredible talent. In fact, one of my favorite moments of AJ was the first time he got to wrestle Kurt Angle. My jaw never leave the floor, I mean just the intensity of everything that they brought to the table was just mind blowing to me. Everything about seeing these two wrestle since then was just insane and believable. Another major factor of me being an AJ Styles fan, is just how he could...
Post a Comment
Read more

Stevie Ray Vaughn (Blues Musician)

In my humble opinion, the most underrated genre in the history of music is the blues. With that being said, I recently finished watching a documentary on a blues musician named Stevie Ray Vaughn. Not obviously he was before my time as he tragically passed away the same year that me and my twin brother Chad were born 1990. Rest In Peace! I was checking out one of my personal favorite channels on TV AXS TV and I saw that they were going to air this documentary and me being a fan of the blues and wanting to know more about the history of the blues as well as music in general, I decided to sit back and watch it. Thank you God! I enjoyed every single second of it. Getting to see how Stevie was coming up and what he went through growing up and how he used his struggles to create such amazing art really was inspiring to me.  I also loved about they talked about the rise of the "Texas Blues" and working his way through small clubs which honestly I think it be cool to have a blues clu...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Orange Years: The Nickelodeon Story (2018 Movie)

 My twin brother Chad and I got to rewatch an old documentary on Tubi and it is called The Orange Years: The Nickelodeon Story. This was a film that made its way into the world back in 2018 and it discusses the origin of a small, humble network leaning into the SNICK years. This documentary was written and directed by Scott Barber and Adam Sweeney. And features some of biggest stars that appeared on their programs as well as some of the executives and talented writers who made them. People like Melissa Joan Hart, Kel Mitchell, Josh Server and great shows such as Doug, Clarissa Explains All, Rugrats, and so forth. With all of that being said, I absolutely loved this documentary. Me and Chad were just completely in awe of it. This brought us back to our childhood getting to see how Nickelodeon became what it was. Getting to listen to all of the people in the know and hear them tell these incredible stories really makes me wish that I could be apart of that. Especially being a writer ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Replaying Mass Effect 1

 Well, I finally did it! I recently finished playing the original Mass Effect game that came out back in 2007. It was created by Casey Hudson and developed by Bioware while being published by Microsoft Game Studios. The game takes place within the Milky Way galaxy in the year 2183 where civilization is being attacked by the return of an highly advanced machine race better known as the Reapers. First and foremost, I wanted to say Thank you to my dear friend Stephon who surprised me with this incredible gift of getting me Mass Effect Legendary Edition. I was completely shocked when he sent it to me, I mean to be fair, I was constantly talking about the Mass Effect series and how it shaped me writing wise as well as fun memories of gaming. But still, I am extremely grateful for the gift and am going to make the most of it. Just seeing the intro to the first game was enough to make my heart smile. I was grinning from ear to ear as I made my character, or at least my version of Shepard....
Post a Comment
Read more

"Irish" Micky Ward (Boxing Legend)

 One of my personal heroes in the world of sports is former professional boxer "Irish" Micky Ward who competed from 1985 to 2003. Ward has held the IBF light welterweight championship in 1997 and then later the WBU light welterweight championship in 2000. I was first introduced to Ward in large part thanks to his legendary trilogy of fights between himself and another one of my personal favorite boxers in Arturo "Thunder" Gatti (RIP), two of those three fights won Fight of the Year awards courtesy of the Ring magazine. Another reason why I became such a fan of Ward is because of his style of fighting. Known as a pressure fighter, no matter what happens to him in the ring, just know that Ward was going to keep pushing forward. Ward was always consider the underdog in most of his bouts, but it sure didn't look like at it at times. His nonstop action is something that admire about him even to this very day. Especially getting to learn more about him since his retir...
Post a Comment
Read more

Smokey The Bear

 You want to talk about making a cultural impact on the lives of many, look no further than the lovable cartoon known as Smokey the Bear. For nearly 100 years now, this protector of the forest has been helping all of us understand the importance of fire safety and putting a stop to wildfires. And has Smokey done such an incredible job in doing so having appeared in numerous posters, ads, clothes, commercials, etc. Making this the longest running public service announcement campaign in United States history. Smokey made his debut due to the many experienced firefighters or able bodied males were out fighting World War 2 and so Smokey was created to help reduce unplanned wildfires caused by human errors. Although he began as a cartoon, Smokey soon became a living breathing creature. An unfortunate accident which caused a wildfire in New Mexico where a small three month old black bear who was sadly burnt in multiple places. Originally, they called the bear Hotfoot Teddy, but soon was ...
Post a Comment
Read more