Note from Alissa: Guys this post is meant to be funny. You know humor. Laughing is what we do around here. .especially when we’re all going crazy waiting for this update to hit. So relax. It’s a joke. Remember it’s ok to laugh…
AsI may have mentioned in my last article regarding the upcoming (please?) Winter/Holiday event, I have a slightly contentious relationship with EA.
What I am about to write is not likely to get me added to their Christmas card list. But, I have a suspicion, perhaps even a hunch (but not quite strong enough to be considered a prognostication), about what rEAlly happened to keep EA from releasing the aforementioned update when I thought they would/should last week.
Let’s be clear…I realize that we are ALL sick and tired of talking about “Election 2016,” but there is little doubt in my mind that the election combined with regular EALPish behavior, created the perfect fog, which ended up delaying the release.
Conspiracy, wild theory, or just pragmatic reasoning? You tell me…
But, HERE is what I think happened…
I’m happy to report that this horrible result had nothing to do with the Presidential election (you can all relax now…and take your fingers off of the keyboard, where you were about to send me a rash of Facebook re-posts, Tweets, and Insta-spams to give me your opinions).
But, while the country was electing a new President, something very interesting happened that likely kept us all from actually seeing snow in our towns last week.
California legalized recreational cannabis use. And it went into effect immediately.
I know. I know. It didn’t really surprise anyone. But, the fact is, there was a LOT of celebrating in California, especially those areas of California most prone to have reason to celebrate…as in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and specifically, Hollywood.
Let’s also recognize that computer programmers/artists/writer-types have been prone to “mind expanding” or “relaxation” use of “medicinal herbs.” So…combining the fact that EA is full of programmer/writer types (along with Gracie Films) who live and work in several of those cities, and have been hinting, joking, alluding to exactly these kinds of “creative tools” in TSTO dialogue, and you have the “perfect fog” for OVER-Celebration!
Add to this, a LONG history of EA being Lazy Programmer folks (hence the term EALP) who often take shortcuts, and leave what starts as a great update, only to peter out in a long exhaled fizzle. There are countless times that ACT II of an event is the best Act, and Act III just feels like they ran out of energy or time. It’s fairly typical these days.
But, now…with perhaps as much as two full weeks of recreational celebration of the new cannabis laws, it may be possible that they just, plain, forgot to hit the “START” button.
You can almost hear them talking…whispering over their cubical walls…
“Hey…dude…how come the update didn’t start on Wednesday like we planned?” says one programmer.
“What do you mean? I called in sick last week, and I had some PTO the week before. I thought YOU were supposed to flip the server switch,” says the other programmer.
“What…you were sick last week? Pffffftttt… I was taking PTO last week. I kinda lost my car keys for a week,” says the first guy chuckling to himself.
“DUDE!! You and me bro! I lost my house keys somewhere at the Taco Bell…and then I couldn’t remember if it was Taco Bell, or Burrito King…and then…well…I didn’t care. But, I thought you were doing it. What about Barry? Where was Barry?” asked programmer number two.
“Barry? Whoa…I forgot about Barry. He took off, man…he’s gonna be a bud-tender at some dankster place downtown…dank, dude. Very dank. So should we throw the switch now?” asks number one.
“Nah…come on. If we do it on a day other than Wednesday, we may have to do more support, or FIX something…most people aren’t here on Monday’s…we got the monorail thing every Tuesday…and let’s be honest, the weekend starts on Thursday! Pffttt…uhahahahaha…so Wednesday…Is it Wednesday today?”
This could have gone on for days.
So…. That leaves us with NEXT Wednesday. I know that this will “harsh your mellow” folks, but the fact is…EA just, plain forgot to hit “start.” It wasn’t personal. They were celebrating. It’s natural.
For those of you who think that this may be unfair to programmers and Hollywood writers, let me ask you this…do you KNOW any Hollywood writers or programmers who live in California? I do. And it is FAR more likely that they “forgot,” than actually PLANNED to launch the update this week.
But hey…we had a nice weekend. We were all able to enjoy the weekend, put up Christmas lights, and in general, simply enjoy something other than TSTO.
It will come. The guys will hit “START,” The snow will come to our towns…and we will look back on this week fondly...if we can remember it. Right Barry?
SEE YOU SATURDAY for ADDICTS LIVE! I have a New Santa Hat I’m dying to show you…
For those of you who followed my Christmas traditions the last couple of years…Pooh and friends when up this weekend. No help from Barry.
