Burrito Syndicate (Syndicate...Syndicate...)
Friday, Aug. 01, 2003
The last four meals I�ve eaten have included burritos. Yesterday morning, I had a combo #8 with a diet coke from McRonald. That�s two breakfast burritos and a potato cake. Then, for lunch, I had a double-decker taco supreme and a bean burrito from Taco Bell. Then, for dinner, Aisai picked me up two bean burritos from Taco Bell.
Aisai had gone to Knoxville with Leeann to see her friend Kelly. Leeann is headed back to the UK on Thursday after visiting with us for 2.5 months. Hopefully, David, her husband, has restored a few rooms that her and Damian, their three year old, can live in normally while she was gone. They bought this near mansion of an old, in fact 400 year old, house, in need of mucho restoration. So much restoration, in fact, that Leeann fled the country to escape it.
And speaking of doing without some conveniences, I�m about to ditch the cable modem at home. I�m not using it. Basically, the RIAA has me scared that they�ll nab me for downloading modern alternative music and 80s rock anthems. I just hope that Sony doesn�t send me something to beta test while I have the cable modem removed.
And speaking of such stuff, they sent me the demo of Downhill Domination, which sounds like an S&M sledding game, but it�s downhill bike racing. I haven�t opened it. It�s just the SSX engine applied to bikes. And, it�s not like it�s still being developed. They just sent me a demo disk to keep me buttered up so that I will test some piece of crap later.
I�m playing Ratchet & Clank again. Man, when can I buy the freakin� Tesla claw. I thought it was offered when I got to the logging planet. I�ve just done the ice planet and I�m headed back to the beachside resort planet to get the persuadatron, or whatever, so it lowers the prices at the Gagetron Vendor.
Persuadatron was actually the name of the device used in the classic PC game Syndicate. If ever there was a concept that needed to have a movie made of it, it�s Syndicate. Kidnap those who are physically fit and fit them with cybernetic implants and injectors for temporary physical and mental enhancement drugs, arm them, and then put them on the streets. Like Grand Theft Auto, there are missions, but some of the best action comes when you are just trying to survive. My most remembered thing my people were able to do was�four of them were trapped on an overpass like structure. The cops were coming from all around, as were rival syndicate agents. The rival agents and the cops were armed with short range gear, and I had taken the chance and armed all my people with long range rifles in addition to their sidearms�.so they were standing on this overpass, rifles out, juiced with drugs which would calm them and sharpen their vision. They were picking off people three blocks away, where I couldn�t even see what they were aiming at unless I scrolled away from them. Very, very cool.
Syndicate is a little like the Sims, with heavy artillery and explosions. You can control your people, but they will also defend themselves. In fact, left to their own devices, they�d just defend the area they are in.
What the persuadatron was meant for was to brainwash cops, citizens, and occasionally rival syndicate members. If you brainwash a cop, he�ll help defend you. Citizens will do this too, if they have guns, which they�ll pick up off dead rival syndicate members. But I tended to overuse it. Get to a crowded city street and turn it on. Soon you have a swirling mass of 50+ citizens walking around you. Then, roam into the territory of the bad guys. When they shoot at you, they�ll probably hit a citizen, rather than your people. When you need to escape these sheepy people, just hop in car and drive away from them. Very few will make the trek and catch up with you.
Oh, and this morning I had breakfast burritos again from McD. I also wanted a parfait, which seems to be yogurt, blueberries, and strawberries. But they said they didn�t have them ready. Hmm, I might have to go get one at lunch or something. They looked good.