Winter Guide: Gear that’s cool as ice…

Some people say that hitting the slopes is about man versus wild, an exhilarating thrill ride that tests your skills against the best Mother Nature has to offer. Yeah, right. Really, it’s about looking good while hitting those ollies and aerial grabs, so here’s the newest gear to keep you hot while looking cool.

TEAM I

Remember your roots with this freestyle snowboard designed by the 4-year-old son of a HEAD Snowboards employee. The company, with a full line of boards, boots, bindings and protective gear, wants to inspire the masses with a crazy diorama of stick figures hurtling down the slopes while trying to avoid dinosaurs, sharks and an onslaught of missiles. While the drawings may be childish, the board is all grown up. A tip-to-tail wood core is laced with Kevlar and carbon fibers to increase agility, and the sintered base provides high wax absorption. In case the creativity of a child is too limiting, the board, retailing at $529, comes with a pack of high quality Edding markers to add your own individuality to the snow. Ridehead.com

Headphone Beanie Hat

You’re rockin’ a killer board and poised to head down the mountain, but the whistle of the wind doesn’t do justice to the epic moves you’re about to pull off. Pump a great soundtrack into the descent with this tech-inspired beanie with built in headphones. A flapjack or visor style holds adjustable headphones in the lining, and a 48-inch cord that plugs into any 3.5 mm headphone jack gives plenty of flexibility in range of motion. At $24.99, this ThinkGeek combo gives you warmth and tunes suitable for the lodge or half pipe. ThinkGeek.com

Snow Report Apps

If the jams are coming from an iPhone or iPod Touch, make sure you also have a couple of free snow report apps on hand to give you the latest weather information. The North Face Snow Report and REI Snow Report apps provide the same information with slightly different delivery methods. Along with forecasts, recent snowfall levels, and contact information, you can find out which world resorts are open, how many lifts and trails are operating and check out the resort’s Twitter feed. Which app finds a permanent spot in your phone will boil down to personal preferences; REI allows you to set alerts for new snowfall at your favorite slopes, and North Face has a sleek red and black design and live webcam feeds. Apple.com/iTunes

ezGear echargeable Hand Warmer

Avoid freezing your fingers off when checking those apps with a hand warmer that won’t make people think you pulled it out of a fanny pack. The compact and understated design looks like it fits alongside Apple’s signature style when you’re sizing up the fresh snow down the road. The warmer will provide three hours of heat and is rechargeable more than 500 times via a USB connection to your computer or USB wall outlet. Unlike gel packs, this $29.99 heater comes with an on/off switch, so you can pop it on just long enough to grab a cup of coffee or keep it running on the lift. ezGear.com

Borderlands…

On the ramshackle planet of Pandora (think TV’s space-westernFirefly) the best aspects of a first-person shooter and a role-playing game have come together. Somewhere there’s a lost treasure to be had, but like most quest-based games the majority of your time will be spent in mini plots designed to move you about the world. Neither the FPS nor RPG elements are too in-depth, but the mashup is entertaining. The RPG contributions (skill trees, leveling and stats) give life to the tired FPS genre that carries its own here by providing fast-paced action and supposedly almost 18 million weapons. Revolvers with bullets that spray acid and shotguns that burst with electricity are as fun as they sound. The loot system is similar to RPGDiablo, so you spend too much time picking up endless items and comparing their stats. If you can find a good group for multiplayer, you’ll be in store for exponentially more difficult baddies in an environment that thrives off teamwork. The slightly twisted artistic style mirrors the feel of this quirky game that breathes new life into two genres—right before blowing heads off with a fire-spewing submachine gun.

The Essential “Weird Al” Yankovic…

The soundtrack of my life is weird. In grade school, I learned that “mashed potatoes can be your friends” and I spent four years of high school “living in an Amish paradise.” Bands come and go, but “Weird Al” Yankovic has remained. For this retrospective, the prince of parody handpicked a collection that shows off not only his progression as a musician but that of our musical tastes as a society as well. Early songs parodying Queen and Devo turn to P. Diddy and Green Day. His parodies may be his most universally known work, but Weird Al’s original material is without comparison. Fan favorites “The Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota” and “Albuquerque” show his band’s solid musical chops. Nonsensical humor is currently a big trend in mass media, but Weird Al’s trips to Minnesota and Albuquerque not only set the standard, they surpassed it. It’s fitting that he joins Elvis, Springsteen and MJ in Sony’s Essential series. For more than 30 years, Al and his band mates have churned out song after song holding a fun-house mirror to society. And for some the music has just let us be who we are: white and nerdy.

The List…

It’s a cover album; get over it. (Dooley Wilson’s take on “As Time Goes By” in Casablanca is a cover and that turned out pretty good, huh?) Judge Rosanne Cash’s take on classic country songs on its own merit and it turns out to be a pretty good album. The 12 tracks here stem from a list of 100 essential country songs that Roseanne’s father, Johnny Cash, gave to her on her 18th birthday. Rooted in the love and pain of the working class, these songs require a sense of longing to make them poignant and not cliché to today’s ears. Cash never slips into trite feelings but occasionally the sound is more like a $5 latte than a pot of black joe. “Miss the Mississippi and You” doesn’t quite make us miss the song that everyone from Bob Dylan to Emmylou Harris has covered—let alone Mississippi—but Cash hits other tunes out of the park: The haunting and mournful classic folk tune “500 Miles” and the Carter family’s “Bury Me Under the Weeping Willow” deserve to be placed alongside a bottle of whiskey under a balmy Southern sunset. Overall, there’s enough gritty desire to rouse an interest in her take on the other 88 songs on the list.

Castle: The Complete First Season…

In this Murder, She Wrote-esque cop drama, Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion, Firefly) tags along with Detective Beckett (Stana Katic) to research his next mystery novel, and, of course, helps solve murders along the way. Fillion eats up his role, and Katic balances him nicely by bringing depth to her character’s backstory: a move that elevates the series from the “murder a week” formula. The love-hate relationship between Castle and Beckett, her ability to put him in his place, and Fillion’s one-liners keep us turning the metaphorical pages. Fans of Fillion’s Captain Hammer (or Captain Tightpants) from Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along Blog will appreciate the heart-of-gold machismo he continues to embody, but the best part of the series isn’t contained in the DVDs. ABC has expanded the story to involve multiple media and the result is effective and fun. You can follow Richard Castle on Twitter (WriteRCastle) and the novel, Heat Wave, which Castle is writing throughout the first season, is now available at your local bookstore. These additions to the Castle universe give us a deeper view of the characters and create an intriguing mix of reality television voyeurism and escapist fun. Now if only Castle were as sexy as Jessica Fletcher.

TFLN: Txts Frm Lst Nght…

Distill the Internet into a single site and you wind up at Txts Frm Lst Nght. Crude and sexual, the site shows our society’s true face. The concept is simple: An intoxicated friend texts you something embarrassing at 4 in the morning, you post the text to the Web site, the world laughs at his or her failure, and you go back to sleep happy. Scrolling through the shame of others, it’s hard not to glimpse yourself in their low points. Rock bottom may not look the same as you remember it, no one may have scolded you by saying “just because you dressed up as a brontosaurus doesn’t mean you can poop in my front yard and roar at the neighbors,” but we’ve all had to apologize the next morning for something. Alcohol isn’t the only instigator; pot plays a large part in many texts: “What if cement was really a rainbow color and they just secretly paint it grey so as not to distract drivers.” Acts of kindness and happiness (not relating to sexual conquests) are rare, sporadic enough only to provide bits of hope against the pooping dinosaurs of our lives.

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2…

The Marvel universe has tens of thousands of comic characters, a diverse canon that successfully fueled the original Ultimate Alliance but is strangely missing from the sequel. The overhead multiplayer button masher (choose whether to crush wave after wave of enemies with the A, B or X button) features a wide range of heroes and villains, both familiar and obscure, but it has lost some of the depth. For example, each character only has two costume choices, down from four. That’s not simply an aesthetic loss because some costume changes essentially create new characters. Thor for instance could become Beta Ray Bill. It’s not a deal breaker, but the whole thing reeks of future downloadable content—which means shelling out more money. The story pits hero against hero in an arc that loosely follows the Civil War comics but you’ll probably skip past most of it to get to the best part of the game: killing your thumbs. Not every game can inspire caffeine-fueled marathons and this one feels like a middle-school nerd’s Friday night created from an adult perspective. If you’re not crying, “carpal tunnel!” after seven hours of joyfully destroying everything in sight, then you’re missing out.

Batman: Arkham Asylum…

For years, nerds have pieced together the ideal Batman, in a cape-and-cowl version of the “I’ll take the breasts of Marilyn Monroe and the legs of Betty Page” game. Now, their fantasies have come true. When Joker takes over Arkham Asylum, the criminal madhouse that houses all of Batman’s worst enemies, Batman realizes he has a long night ahead of him. Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill, respectively, voice Batman and the Joker, the roles they once held in Batman: The Animated Series, and the pairing is perfect. The Batmobile from the 1989 Michael Keaton film makes a cameo, and the gritty, dirty, brutal images of the dilapidated and troubled villains are reminiscent of graphic novels such as Batman: The Killing Joke. All together, this mash-up makes for a wonderful ride. A variety of hidden items (240 Riddler trophies alone) will ensure a second time through the loony bin, but you’ll need to use a sort of night-vision technology to find them. It’s a shame because you’ll spend 90 percent of the time playing through a blue haze, missing the detailed and grim environments. When it comes to the Batman canon, consider this moreDark Knight and considerably less Batman Forever.

Adventures in Geekdom…

It’s 5:37 a.m. on a Friday, and I can barely shuffle forward through the airport-security line. That large Red Bull I downed for breakfast opens only one of my eyes, but some guys near the back of the line utter two words and I’m wide awake: “Resto Druid.”

Instantly, I know they’ll also be on my flight headed to Orange County for Blizzcon, an annual gaming convention put on by Blizzard Entertainment, best known for the hugely popular multiplayer online game World of Warcraft.

Blizzard fans are true geeks incarnate. Fanatically devoted to the brand, these gamers immerse themselves in fantasy worlds such as Diablo, Starcraft and, of course, World of Warcraft, which alone boasts 11 million players worldwide. Some 26,000 geeks will attend this year’s Blizzcon.

Accordingly, over the past decade, the general public has paid increasingly more attention to a budding geek culture. Fashion adopted nerd glasses and Hollywood’s highest-grossing films have been titles such as Star Trek, Harry Potter, Spider-Man and Transformers. Now, it’s not only cool to own an iPod, it’s also a status symbol.

Geek is chic.

But while some see this as a chance for the trampled-on meek to rise up, the geek revolution likely will not be televised—simply because there will be no revolution.

You see, the mainstream media only is interested in a facade of true geek culture—the equivalent of wearing a Darth Vader costume on Halloween. In reality, true geeks have distanced themselves even more from status quo.

Blizzcon speaks to this fringe-geek way of life: passionate and awkward men and women who demand something mainstream society can never provide—and if mainstream society offered it, they wouldn’t even want it.

Consider Manzi Deyoung, who’s at Blizzcon dressed as High Inquisitor Whitemane, a boss from the Scarlet Monastery dungeon in World of Warcraft. Her costume, which took roughly 120 hours to construct, is dead on in its accuracy. And her combination of red thigh-high boots, elbow-length gloves and large phallic staff isn’t lost on the fanboys, either. People snap her picture and compliment the costume’s attention to detail. Deyoung effortlessly shifts into the same poses that Whitemane would strike in the game.

“I definitely think that WoW has something unique to it,” Deyoung says while chilling outside the Anaheim Convention Center. “More so than even Star Trek, WoW has a distinct language. You can make a joke about Vulcans and people are going to get it.”

A new nerd language is a means for geeks to offset mainstream culture. While playing World of Warcraft, gamers forgo English in favor of a watered-down language of abbreviations. Specifically, most gamers talk in code, “1337” or “leetspeak,” a language of typographical shortcuts that uses deliberately incorrect spelling and grammar.

A typical chat message during World of Warcraft, for instance, might read, “LFM DPS 1Healz no shammy 4 H HOL.” In English, this means: “I’m in a group that is looking for more people. We need one person who does damage per second and one healer—but no Shamans—who want to do the Heroic version of Halls of Lightning.”

Geek speak also carries over into real life.

“Are you Horde?” someone at Blizzcon asks, sliding an arm around my shoulder. After loading up on overpriced beers from the bar, my friends and I made our way to a rooftop pool, where hundreds of people cram into lounge chairs and even flower beds. We also discover Sippy, said stranger with his arm on my back.

“Are you for the Horde?” he repeats, wanting to know which side I’m on.

“Alliance,” I reply, hesitantly.

“Dude. That. Doesn’t. Matter,” he says. “Whether you’re Horde or Alliance, we’re all here for the same reason: The World. The World, man.

“I still like you,” he reassures before stumbling off.

Inside the convention, which is filled with spiraling colored lights and huge banners, a Zealot on stilts, Night Elf Druids, Draenei, Boomkin and a Mistress of Pain—a spider-woman who would eventually win the convention’s costume contest—roam the halls along with people of all ages, and even families.

“What a lot of people looking in from the outside don’t understand is the social elements to these games,” says Todd Pawlowski, who is attending Blizzcon with his wife, Cheri, and his 10-year-old triplets: Jordan, Caitlin and Lukas.

“The kids brought me into [World of Warcraft]. I actually took a job with Blizzard because of what I saw in their game,” he explains. Pawlowski moved his family from the Bay Area to Irvine, in Orange County, where he now works as Blizzard’s vice president of customer service.

“I know grandparents who keep in touch with their grandchildren through Warcraft. Friends and families stay connected using these games.”

Some friends take things to the extreme.

Brandon Kunimura and his pals Jin Kim and Paul Hsu wear cow outfits and carry giant weapons—an homage to a secret level in the Diablo series—and women at the convention flock toward the herd. Jenny Harris, dressed as the Grand Widow Faerlina, even snuggles up to take a photo with the cows.

“It’s about the quality of the game,” explains one giant cow. “There is a depth to the stories that you’ve come to expect.” And it’s the depth that nurtures camaraderie.

“I started when I was unemployed. I had to kill things,” explains Arabella Benson, whose Warlock hood falls across her face as she bends to pick up a piece of weapon off the ground. “Then I started meeting people in the game, forming friendships. I got into the story and joined a guild. I’ve become friends in real life with some of these people.”

World of Warcraft is like Facebook on crack: Fans embrace it to a degree that the mainstream can never keep up with—or even accept. Rare game items sell for nearly $1,000 on eBay. And the penchant for dressing up in costume is like the Oakland Raiders’ black hole times 10. And the fans vary from young to old.

A boy who can’t be older than 14 steps in my path.

“This is my dad’s room. We’re Horde,” he informs.

“Good to know. For the Horde!” I masquerade, setting off repeated shouts.

“This is my dad’s room. We’re Horde,” he reminds as I walk off.

Inside the room, heated debate over weapons, dungeons and quests punctuates a cacophony of cheers and garbled 1337 speak. A beer-pong table grabs my attention, however, so an Alliance friend and I challenge two members of the Horde to a contest.

The room becomes silent and all eyes focus on our game. I suddenly wonder if Sippy’s love-to-all attitude perhaps is not universal. An odd sensation, perhaps Crips vs. Bloods mixed with Star Wars vs. Star Trek, permeates the room, but the important lesson to take away is that we, the Alliance, beat the Horde. And beat them bad.

One of the last things I remember at the convention is hearing Michael Morhaime, president and co-founder of Blizzard, say something while standing over us in the hotel bar while playing the World of Warcraft card game at 4 a.m.

“This is great. Can I get a picture?” he asks. For nongeeks, this is the equivalent of President Barack Obama wanting to shake your hand. We barely have time to strike a pose, let alone bow and chant “We’re not worthy” before he’s gone.

One thing I learned from Blizzcon is that this rich and unique world may seem trivial, even ridiculous, but geeks will protect it. And with every forward step mainstreamers take, geeks will retreat three steps back, continually building upon a culture that most don as a costume once a year.

The Beatles: Rock Band…

It’s taken many hard day’s nights to bring the Fab Four to the video-game realm, but Beatlemania has finally arrived. With 45 songs that trace the career of the greatest band of all time, the story mode is brilliant. The staging of the songs starts out rooted in realism, but recreated performances such as The Ed Sullivan Show appearace eventually give way to studio sessions that dissolve into “Yellow Submarine”-inspired trips. The blend of realism and psychedelic elements is refreshing in a genre that’s growing stale with every cookie-cutter installment. However, at the core, this is still the same game we’ve played for years: Grab an instrument, hit the notes. The iconic band is both the appeal and the Yoko Ono of the game. You can’t customize band members to make yourself the fifth Beatle and if you ever get the hankering for some Steve Miller or Ozzy, you’re out of luck. Some wonder why this wasn’t just released as downloadable content for any of the pre-existing Rock Band games, but then you’d have to take the time to download 45 tracks … and yet you know you would download them all: It’s the freakin’ Beatles.