It is with great sadness...

Since the inception of the Nelsen blog I have stood back, watching and silently worrying about what my sweet wife was posting. As time passed I eventually began to express my concerns to Kara that the site did not adequately represent the majority of the Nelsen population. I told her that I would be forced to start posting if for no other reason than to inject some manly testosterone into the blog for myself, Andrew, and Grant. Well, that day has finally come, and I am not as happy about it as I thought I would be. You see, I often wondered what topic would finally fill me with enough manly pride to sit down and actually blog about it. Would it be about what I'm going to do if gas prices finally break $4.00 in Texas? Would it be about "The Dark Knight"? (Which if you haven't seen you need to stop reading this and go see it right now. Yes it's that good and yes it lives up to all the hype and more. I'm serious, get up and go see it right now!) Would it be about my brother's marriage and our (interesting to say the least) bachelor party the night before the wedding? Or would it be some other manly endeavor like camping, building, fixing, hunting, cool cars, BBQing etc.?

Well, what finally brought me to sit down before you today is to relate the realization of my deepest and darkest fears. It is an event so horrifying that it has been plaguing my waking moments for nearly two years now...and it finally occurred in my home yesterday evening. The funny thing is that I actually had begun to think that I might have escaped it, as I had outlasted the majority of my friends. My, what foolishness! If only I'd known as I mourned with their losses while silently cheering my luck! But my time has come :(

For those of you who are familiar with the Xbox 360 you know the fear of which I speak and how it haunts the owners on a daily basis. What do we the owners of one of the greatest pieces of machinery of our day have to fear you ask? Well, I will tell you....The Red Ring of DEATH!!!

You see, when you first turn on the Xbox 360 you are greeted by the familiar power ring, which leaves you feeling very confident and manly, ready to kick the tar out of whatever alien, zombie, terrorist, etc. you are facing.The complete ring fades down to the number controllers that are plugged in during game play, serving as a monitor of sorts to the status of your wireless controller.

All Systems Go!

It was not long after the initial release of the console, however, that those feelings of confidence were replaced with the aforementioned fear and dread. Gamers soon began to witness not the familiar green glow welcoming them to battle, oh no, but a strange and mystifying Red Ring. To everyone's utter shock and horror, this ring was followed shortly (if not immediately) by the complete and total crash of the Xbox 360 system. In other words your $400 system just experienced a hardware failure and is now worth less than the game you were trying to play. The Red lights became known as the Red Ring of Death because they, like the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, signaled the complete and utter destruction of your system.

I'm Sorry Dave, I'm Afraid I Can't Do That...

From what I understand the problem is due to the poor the soldering of the internal components. You see the 360 runs pretty hot (it has to handle all the spiffy graphics) and it heats up during use. Couple this with insufficient cooling and the specific type of lead-free solder used and WHAM!!! Stress builds up between the joints of the CPU, GPU, and the motherboard, and they all break, breaking your soul with them. Fortunately Microsoft has recognized the error of their ways and has extended everyone's warranty, so I all have to do is ship it back to them and they will fix it. The process generally takes anywhere from 3-6 weeks depending on who you ask. This cuts it dangerously close to the release of Force Unleashed, but I think I'll live.

Yikes.In the mean time....

what am I going to do while Kara is blogging?!?!?

I've come for your soul!