CE Wills

    Neon Shadow is a new game for I-Pad that I have been enjoying. It is a space game in which you are sent to a ship and are searching it. You find that there are no human inhabitants. This in itself is not a bad thing for a hermit like myself but the AI for the ship keeps talking to me. He also threatens me on a routine basis which leads me to macho, Mano-e-mano feelings toward him. In other words, I want to punch his face. This is awkward considering the fact that he is without a body.       One of the first things I noticed as I was strolling around with my gun was "Dog Doors". They aren't really dog doors because there are no dogs on the vessel. But I knew that they had been made for something short and I was not left in the dark for long. Sure enough, robotic creatures began to emerge from these openings and they attacked me with malice aforethought. I shot them and I really enjoyed the explosions that resulted. The gameplay is fun and uncomplicated.     I fo

    Hey, everyone. Doubtless, you gamers think that I have deserted you. I say unto thee, nay. I want to talk in depth about Gameloft's game called Thor, The Dark World . I have a love/hate relationship with this game.     I have played the darn thing for about 100 hours or more. I find it to be complex, addicting, (a word overused by gamers) and fun. To play it very far you will probably have to buy some in-apps unless you are a far better gamer than I, which wouldn't take much of a stretch. At the present time, though, I believe the game is free, which is a good price. Ha, ha.      Also, there are some glitches in this game. As I mentioned on a previous post, I bought an in-app that I didn't receive. Then there were times when I didn't receive rewards that I had earned in-game. Furthermore, I got a message from them that stated they were loading an on-line profile ********* blah blah. When I clicked yes, it loaded an old save point which cost me some in-game coin.

    Hey, everyone. Carley and I went to the theater the other night and saw the latest Keanu Reeves flick entitled 47 Ronin . We both liked it and I'd recommend it as an action film or a romance.    I have always loved Japanese movies and have been fascinated by that culture since Shogun . I liked Last Samauri as well.     The story takes place several hundred years ago and involves a halfbreed guy who is not a samurai and is therefore treated about as well as navel lint by the ruling class. He has had the misfortune(?) to fall in love with the local princess, Mika (Ko Shibasaki). Her dad runs the province of Ako as a Daimyo, under the rule of the  Shogun.     One of the interesting aspects of the movie is the fantasy side of it. I don't mean like a Britney Spears/Miley Cyrus fantasy, but rather a magic, sword and sorcery thing. For instance, there is a fox that appears as a sort of bad omen. It is white and has one eye that is purple and the other eye is amber. (Don't

     Hey, everyone. Tonight we watched an entertaining film on TV called Feds. It stars Mary Gross as Janis Zuckerman, an F.B.I. trainee who befriends Ellie Dewitt (Played by Rebecca DeMornay). The two women have the temerity to enter the agency's tough training course and have to endure all the sexist B.S. associated with male-dominated trades.     The two ladies are light-years apart in personalities and skills, which helps them cope with life in the fast lane of law enforcement. Jane is a book nerd, brilliant and reserved. Her roomie is Ellie, an ex-Marine with spunk, attitude, street smarts and guts. Together they can manage to do more than survive at the academy; they flourish.      Ellie must help her pardner with things like weapons training, P.T. and cuffing criminals. Janis must help the book- challenged Ellie with her studies. As the ranks of their particular class are decimated by a 75% washout rate, the two females manage to impress their tough supervisor, played by

   Hey, everyone. So, what's up? Today is a pretty day with sunshine and a temperature in the forties. I was thinking about raking and burning leaves. I wasn't thinking about it very seriously, just thinking about it. Ha, ha.      I had a cool burger last night. If you ever get a chance to try this one you should consider it. It was a huge rascal, so big that even my mouth had difficulty wrapping around it. It was a bacon and egg burger with all the trimmings. I must say that it was perhaps the best burger I ever ate. The leaky egg made it so moist and tasty. Of course, I like eggs with steak for breakfast on rare occasion and I really like beer with that dish as well, or champagne.     Hey, did you see where they are getting on the James Bond character for his boozing? Yeah. They already made it socially unacceptable for him to smoke. Next will be his womanizing, no doubt. Soon, all literature, games, movies, T.V. and print media will have all of us walking stiffly aroun

   Hey, everyone, snuggled in your beds in some far-away land. Even now you are perhaps beginning your day. Some will go out and herd cattle in the Outback of Australia, others will be going to a factory in the U.S.A. Whatever your routine, I'm glad you stopped by the Green Retreat for a few moments.    Here at my place it is cold, 23 degrees at 5 A.M. I woke at 4 A.M. and couldn't go back to sleep. So, I lay and thought about my books. I thought in particular about my Western Series concerning the great gunman, Cedric Gant. My mind wandered peacefully over his life and career. I thought about the things he'd done, the fights he'd been in. How he had gained a wife, and notoriety as a gunslinger. I thought about his failures as a person and their tragic aftermath. I thought about his courage and the good he'd done for many. How he was willing to take the part of the weak and downtrodden.     So the thoughts came and went, there in the darkness of the bedroom, my

   Hey, everyone. For the last few weeks I have been investigating the high-stakes, live on the razor's edge world of gaming. It happened on this wise.     I have been just a tad aggravated with I-Pad gaming for reasons that I have talked about at length on these pages. So, I borrowed an X-Box 360 for the purpose of ascertaining if it would be a feasible source of amusement for a guy with 60 plus years under his belt. I had tried it once before but the controls seemed difficult compared to my Padster. In fact, the tech seemed, dare I say it?) shrouded in the mists of the past compared to touch screen controls on my I-Pad Air.     This time around, I was determined to give it a fair try and play it for a few days or weeks until I decided whether or not to invest in a PS4, a PS3, an X-Box One or an X-Box 360. True to form, I exhaustively read reviews and sought counseling about the matter. My gaming mentor, the doughty Trevor, said that he preferred the PS3 controls ove

    Hey, everyone. It is a cool, foggy night at the author's green retreat. Carley and I went out tonight and strolled into a theater to see The Book Thief . It is a story that is set in Germany, during World War 2. The star of the show is one Liesel, a girl played wonderfully by talented child actress Sophie Nelisse.     Liesel is on board a train at the start of the show, with her mother and brother. The brother dies and Liesel watches men cut a hole in the frozen ground with axes, in order to bury the young boy. Then the 10 or 12 year old girl is left alone because the mother either leaves her or is placed in a concentration camp. At any rate, Liesel winds up with foster parents and may I say that no orphan ever hit the jackpot for foster parents like this little lady did.     The new father is Hans, played by Geoffrey Rush in what may well be an oscar-winning performance. His wife is the dour Rosa (Emily Watson), a crabby person with a heart of gold and that rare toughness