Why the f#@% do they make clothing out of linen? Can somebody tell me this?
Because I bought this really, really expensive shirt that I liked quite a lot. I didn't bother to look at what it was made out of because... well, so long as it's not made from baby kittens, what the f#@% do I care what its made of? So I get it home, wash it, iron it, then decide to wear it... AND IT GETS TOTALLY WRINKLED AFTER ONLY FIVE MINUTES! Yes, FIVE MINUTES! And all I did was walk in it! Not ON it, but IN it. Yet it looks like I wadded it up in a ball, drove over it with my car, then slept in it while hookers danced on my chest.
Well, actually, if all that happened I wouldn't care so much about the wrinkles, but WTF?!?
If linen is this magical fabric that wrinkles without provocation and looks like shit after only five minutes of wear... WHY MAKE CLOTHES OUT OF IT?!? Why? Why? Why?
F#@% it. From now on I'm checking the label to make sure my shirts are made from 100% baby kitten, because I've never seen a wrinkled kitten. Besides, I think this color would look good on me...
Anyway... thanks to the kindness of a very generous reader with mad MPEG conversion skilz, I was able to watch the Veronica Mars premiere. It was slightly below-par because they had to spend time introducing new characters and locations... but oh so delicious and satisfying. STILL the best series on television (well, I haven't seen the sweet hotness of Tina Fey in 30 Rock yet, but I feel relatively safe in standing by my statement).
In other television news so far... Studio 60 is predictably good. Heroes is mind-numbingly mediocre. Jericho is suitably boring. The Class is inexplicably bad. Help Me Help You is "kill me now" horrifyingly awful.
The biggest surprise this season? Ugly Betty was shockingly good. What I thought would be a klutzy attempt at comedic relief ended up being a fascinating, thoughtful, multi-layered show with elements of drama and mystery to keep things interesting. By the time they got to Robert Loggia's character being involved in some kind of shady dealings behind the scenes, I was hooked. Vanessa Williams as a back-stabbing psychotic bitch editor is just the icing on the cake. Thank you Selma Hayek!
Rargh.
Here kitty kitty kitty...
WARNING: CRANKY PANTS ALERT!! CRANKY PANTS ALERT!!
In an attempt to figure out why I've been plagued with headaches for the past few weeks, I went to the eye doctor today. My vision has been freaky lately, and I'm not sure if it's because of my headaches or if it's the CAUSE of my headaches.
In any event, it involved my eyes getting dilated, so I spent the afternoon like this...
The only thing worse than having your eyes dilated on a sunny day is having to drive home with your eyes dilated on a sunny day. And the only thing worse than that is having to put up with DUMBASS BITCHES while you're driving with dilated eyes on a sunny day.
As you exit the great city of Wenatchee, there is one final stoplight. Just before this stoplight is a Starbucks Drive-Thru. It's the stupidest place in the universe for a drive-thru because you can't get out easily. When the light is green, traffic is flowing heavy with people leaving town and you can't get out. When the light is red, traffic is backed up in front of the Starbucks exit and you can't get out then either. Basically, you can check-in to Starbucks, but you can never leave.
So today I am stopped at this light just before the Starbucks exit. The light turns green and I slowly start to move forward. This causes some bitch who JUST GOT TO THE STARBUCK'S EXIT to lay on the horn (honest, she hadn't even STOPPED yet!). I instantly become enraged because I have a headache, my eyes are dilated, and I don't need some whore WHO WASN'T EVEN WAITING TO EXIT honking at me. If she was in such a big hurry, she shouldn't have stopped for coffee. This is what I scream at her...
I HAVE A GREEN LIGHT AND AM NOT GOING TO BLOCK FIFTY CARS TO LET YOUR COFFEE-DRINKING SHIT OUT, SO WHY DON'T YOU TAKE THAT GRANDE LATTE AND SHOVE IT UP YOUR F#@%ING ASS YOU STUPID BITCH!!!
There's no chance she can hear me. Even with my window down, hers are rolled up AND I'm driving past her as I yell. I know this, but I don't care and decide to yell anyway. It will make me feel better.
But I forgot about the cars in the lane next to me. With their windows down, they can hear me just fine. So when a bunch of people start cheering and honking their horns and waving at me with a "thumbs up" I realize that I am destined to rule the earth. There is no denying that my inspirational words appeal to the masses, and it's only a matter of time before I climb my way to the top... one dumbass coffee-drinking whore at a time.
And because I'm in even a worse mood now that I've had to remember all this crap, it must be time for a meme in an extended entry!
→ Click here to continue reading this entry...
In addition to migraines, vision problems, and the inability to sleep... I've also come down with some kind of cold/flu hybrid that has necessitated that I take a sick day. Usually I go to work when I am sick because I've always got so much going on. I even went to work with kidney stones because I had a project due (it's amazing what you can accomplish in-between screams). But today I feel so terrible that I simply could not get out the door.
I've always romanticized sick days, thinking that it's a great way to get paid while watching television and playing video games. But the only television I even attempted was trying to find the current episode of Martha because Tracy told me my Elizabeth Hurley was going to be on (which is about the ONLY way I would ever watch Martha Stewart in anything). Unfortunately, the show was already over by the time I managed to get out of bed. I was going to try a game of Lego Star Wars, but I ached so bad that all I could mange was to crawl back into bed with the hopes of getting some sleep.
It was a good plan for about fifteen minutes, but then my downstairs neighbor decided to make fifty trips between his car and apartment... slamming the door so hard each time that my teeth came loose. So here I am checking my email, writing in my blog, and praying for death's sweet embrace to take me from my misery...
... but not before I watch VERONICA MARS tonight on the CW Network at 9:00pm (8:00pm central)!!
All bow before the best show on television!!
Fortunately, I have a dual-tuner TiVo so I can watch Veronica Mars while recording The Unit which I became addicted to while watching the first season on DVD. I don't normally go for war movies and combat TV, but The Unit is astoundingly good television, and you should check it out if you have a chance.
And, on that note, my neighbor just drove off (squealing brakes and all) so I am going to make one final attempt at sleep before dragging my disease-infested corpse into work so I can at least grab some work to bring back home with me.
Bah... I can't even do a sick day right. Who else but me would want to work on a sick day??
Ooh look! I'm all better now. Well, mostly. I still have vision troubles, but at least the headaches and cold/flu symptoms have faded.
Until I open my email and find a lovely note from somebody with "I'M GOING TO SUE YOUR ASS" as the subject line. This is absolutely my favorite way to start the day, because being threatened with legal action is always such a great motivator first thing in the morning. "Hmmm..." I think to myself, "I wonder what I did this time?" Since I don't recognize the name, I'm guessing something in my blog has upset somebody. Having a blog is such a great way to meet new and interesting people!
HOW NOT TO START A LAWSUIT...
1) Have somebody who doesn't like you sneak a photo of you wearing a Bluetooth mobile phone headset.
2) Have this blood-enemy search the internet for a cartoon which makes fun of people who wear Bluetooth mobile phone headsets in public.
3) Have this same person cut out part of the cartoon so they can insert a picture of YOU...
4) Then have this person email everybody in the office with a cartoon which likens you to a large penis.
5) Find out about the cartoon, see that it was copyrighted by blogography.com, then decide to fire off a nasty email threatening a lawsuit because this person you've never even met decided to humiliate you.
6) Get an email back from blogography.com telling you that they have no idea what you are talking about, have no idea who you are, and have never even been to your city to take your picture.
7) After another furious exchange of emails, discover that people who post cartoons on the internet have no control over what other people do with them, then realize you'll have to find somebody else to sue.
8) Cry silently to yourself because you have nothing better to do than threaten complete strangers with baseless lawsuits.
Somebody remind me why I have a blog again?
Oh yeah! It's so I have a place to bitch about things that bother me!
Now that I'm feeling better, I finally managed to watch the second episode of Heroes, and boy does that show suck ass. It puzzles me greatly how so many critics are going ape-shit in love over this show when it pretty much blows. Just like "Odo," the shape-changing alien on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine that rarely changed shape... here we have super-powered people who rarely use their super powers. I guess special effects are still not cheap enough to do shows like this properly. I can only hope that they eventually get a budget and can have people with flying powers ACTUALLY BE FLYING AROUND AND SHIT. So far we've gotten one lame, SUPER-LAME "flying" shot in the first episode which looked so bad I could have filmed it in my back yard... then a "flying" shot in the second episode which wasn't even flying... it was more like floating. LOOK DUDE, I CAN FLOAT!! Bitch, please. Until you are willing to put the money into decent special effects to do the super-hero show right, don't waste my frickin' time...
I also love how everybody else in the show conveniently has "powers" which don't require special effects. Notice that there isn't a "hero" who can shoot lightning bolts out of their ass... or a "hero" who can walk through walls... or a "hero" who can do ANYTHING even remotely interesting, because that would require actual visual effects, and we can't have that!
What I want to know is how come an episode of Bewitched which was made FORTY F#@%ING YEARS AGO... BEFORE THEY EVEN HAD COMPUTERS has more special effects shots than an episode of this lame-ass show. Screw this stupid crap. I'm done with "Heroes"... so somebody please let me know if they ever get the balls to actually SHOW super-powers instead of just talk about them for an hour.
Thank heavens for Veronica Mars, a detective who ACTUALLY DOES DETECTIVE STUFF in every episode!! Imagine that!
Being sick has given me an overwhelming desire to help others. At first I thought about starting up a medical practice, but I'm too afraid of blood to be a doctor (and, apparently, you need some kind of license to practice medicine). So then I thought about becoming a mental health consultant... that stupid bitch Dr. Laura doesn't have a doctorate in psychology or psychiatry or anything, and she gets away with it just fine. But then you have to listen to people bitch about their problems and who wants to do that?
So I've decided to create my own line of personal care products, but hesitate to do so without getting endorsements from big-name celebrities. In order to entice these famous people to do my bidding, I've decided to create prototype products so that they can see the quality packaging their image will proudly endorse. Here are just a few samples...
Mark Foley says "stay fresh with the biggest douchebag of them all!"
When you think of an itchy, burning crotch... think David Caruso!
Fight fire with fire... when there's a pain in your ass, reach for Ann Coulter!
I'm still trying to decide if Jared the Subway Sandwich Whore should endorse my "Davepound W" wart remover or my "Davmodium" treatment for diarrhea plus gas. Hmmmm... when you think of Jared, do you think of warts... or diarrhea & gas? These executive decisions are totally harsh...
I read a lot of blogs... according to my feed reader, there's 326 of them. You'd think in all those blogs I'd run into other people who have to deal with the freaky crap I seem to get on a regular basis. You'd be wrong.
Take this morning for instance. The first thing I do each day is grab my laptop and check my email. Much to my surprise, there were around thirty messages from people with subject lines like "TMX Elmo HELP PLS!!" and "want to buy TMX" and "NEED 2 ELMO NOW!"—a further check of my spam filter turned up another dozen or so. "WTF?" I said to myself.
Silly me, I had no idea that there is a ten-year anniversary release of that annoying "Tickle Me Elmo" doll from a decade ago. Apparently, just like the first time, these things are in short supply, and people are going ape-shit trying to find one to buy...
After reading through a few messages, I figured out that somebody had accidentally used an email address from one of my unused domains to try and sell a batch of Elmos. Not knowing what else to do, I wrote a script to automatically reply to any mail I got saying that the guy made a mistake with the address and I don't have any Elmos. Then the message is deleted and I'm not bothered.
Fast forward to this afternoon and I get an email from the guy who placed the ad. He tracked me down by doing a WHOIS domain search, apologizes for the mistake, then asks me to please forward any emails I had received. I write back and explain that the emails are automatically deleted, and I'm sorry I can't do anything to help.
So what does the guy do? He places another ad blaming me for deleting emails that were his "personal property," tells everybody they have to send another email, and then posts my actual email address so people can send complaints!
AND THEY DO!!
Not many people, but enough to piss me off.
WTF?!?
How is any of this my fault? At least I was nice enough to tell people about the mistake. I could have just deleted the emails and said nothing! It takes all my will-power not to write back to these morons and tell them to kiss my ass. If I DID have a stupid Elmo TMX doll, I'd put a video of me tearing into it with a chain-saw on YouTube and send them the URL...
Bitter much? Yes. Yes I am. Any time some dumbass decides to post my email address and then invite people to send me complaints, I get a little upset. I'd return the favor, but he did remove it after I asked him to, so I'd rather just let it go.
I should come up with a "Tickle Me Lil' Dave" that pisses on you when you try to tickle him. I'd sell millions.
I am writing this at 2:30am because of a gross error in judgement while self-medicating.
I have a lingering cough from being sick, so I took some cough syrup. But the cough syrup gives me heartburn, so I took an acid reducer. In order to stop the drainage that's causing the cough I took an antihistamine but, since that keeps me awake, I also took a sleeping pill. I was then worried that the sleeping pill wouldn't be enough to counteract the antihistamine so I also took a couple Excedrin PM which is a pain reliever plus sleep aid (which should also help with my headache). I figured all of those things could battle it out while I sleep, and went to bed at the shockingly early hour of 9:30.
I don't like to take pills but, when I'm sick enough, I apparently have no problem shoving the entire medicine cabinet down my throat.
Anyway, it turns out that the sleeping pills win the battle, but the antihistamines win the war. So here I am wide awake at 2:30am watching the season premiere of Battlestar Galactica on my TiVo while eating a chocolate bar, drinking a glass of milk, and writing in my blog...
What an amazing show. I am dumbfounded how Battlestar keeps changing so radically each year. More stuff happens in 15 minutes on this program than happens in 15 episodes of Lost. But almost nobody I know watches it because they're "not into science fiction." What a shame, because it's highly entertaining. Educational too, because it's added "frak" to my vocabulary (it's the "profanity of the future!"). Ordinarily this would be a good thing but, because so few people I know are watching, I end up sounding pretty ridiculous whenever I use it. Oh well. It's their loss, because the evil Cylon robots who kill everybody and have now enslaved humanity are so frakin' hot...
Speaking of frak... it would appear that IKEA, the bestest furniture store ever, has discontinued the shelving units I use for my DVDs. I couldn't find it online, and it doesn't help matters that I can't remember the name of the thing. For all I know, it could be called FRAK. But it's probably FITBO or FLARG or FLOOGBANGER or something like that. I once studied a bit of the Swedish language for a trip to Stockholm (only to find out that everybody there speaks better English than I do). You'd think that this would give me an edge in remembering the names of my furniture, but it does not.
Oog. Is it sad that I've been blogging so long that I am able to provide a link to trip I took three years ago?
UPDATE: It's all good. I passed out around 4:00am, then slept until 9:00am. And now I am up and watching the awesome season premiere episode of South Park for the third time, all because Anthony mentioned it in the comments. I think this is now my favorite episode of the show ever, which is amazing considering this is their tenth season!
Holy crap! Is it just me, or is this season of Saturday Night Live just painfully bad? The show last night with Jamie Pressly has to be the worst episode I can ever recall seeing, and horribly embarrassing for everybody involved. Losing Tina Fey as head writer (and Weekend Update anchor) has killed what little was left of a once great show. I never thought I'd be longing for the insanely stupid "Goat Boy" to come back to SNL, but ANYTHING would be better than this. Who in their right mind will want to host a show that can make even the usually-funny Dane Cook suck ass?
It's a lazy Sunday and so it must be time for bullet points...
• Tower: Sad news this weekend, Tower Records is closing its doors around the globe. Back in high school and college I would look forward to trips to Seattle with my friends because we would often stop at Tower and browse their collection of imports and 12-inch singles. Many times, we'd hit all three locations in Bellevue, Seattle Center, and the U-District to be sure nothing was missed. Of course now-a-days eBay and online specialty shops are a far more reliable and efficient way of finding music, but Tower is responsible for filling many holes in my collection in those early years. Since the store has fond memories for me, I've always stopped at other locations I find in my travels, including shops in London, Dublin, Hong Kong, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur... plus some shops throughout Japan, and several here across the US.
• CBGB: As if that wasn't enough, CBGB is closing its doors as well. I've only been once, but still consider it to be an essential NYC experience and am sad to see it go. Rumor has it that a new CBGB is to be opened in Vegas, which seems wrong in so many ways. If this is actually true, I don't feel so bad that my CBGB T-shirt was ruined years ago.
• Quake: Washington's own Mt. Rainier, which I fly past frequently when inbound to SeaTac Airport, was hit by a minor earthquake last night which I could feel almost a hundred miles away. It is a bit worrisome to think that volcanic activity might be in its future. If such a beautiful landmark were to become another crater (like Mt. St. Helens), it would really put a dent in Seattle's southern view...
• The Departed: As somebody who thinks that Martin Scorsese hasn't made a great film since Goodfellas, I was most pleased with The Departed which may be his best work to date. This is kind of mixed praise though, because this film is essentially a remake of the brilliant trilogy of Infernal Affairs films out of Hong Kong. In many ways, I'd say the original works are superior (and well worth renting), but it's hard to deny that Scorsese did a remarkable job with his interpretation (cops with moles battle organized crime with moles in modern-day Boston). The violence, while harsh, is nowhere near the ridiculous levels of Gangs of New York (which I loathed) and the performances by Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio are fantastic. Jack Nicholson is also great, as expected, but it's difficult to see him as his character instead of "Jack Nicholson" on the screen. About the only negative is the wholly implausible love triangle that develops unnecessarily, but it's a minor quibble. If incidents of blood and violence don't bother you, The Departed well-worth checking out.
Streaming: How is it that YouTube can serve up millions of streaming videos every day, and yet just about everybody else fails miserably at it? Every site I try to watch video on from Sony to Fox to E Online all end up re-buffering every 5 seconds which is just stupid. Why even offer video if it's going to be completely unwatchable? Just put your shit up on YouTube and let somebody who actually knows what they're doing deal with it.
Back before I was in High School, my favorite show on television was WKRP in Cincinnati. Mostly because Loni Anderson's magnificent breasts were a star attraction (though, oddly enough, I was always much more attracted to the dorky Bailey Quarters who I thought was much cuter). The primary premise of the show was that each character was an oddball who would never fit in at another radio station, but seemed right at home with the WKRP family. The main radio DJ on the show was "Dr. Johnny Fever" who was fired from his previous job because he had said "booger" on the air.
Now-a-days, of course, "booger" is so inoffensive that children's books use it in their titles but, back in 1978 when WKRP hit the air, I suppose saying it was a plausible offense for getting fired.
The point here (if you can actually call it that) is this... today, after having Adobe Illustrator crash a record 22 times (I'm keeping count) from Apple's latest 10.4.8 Mac OS upgrade patch, I was about to scream "F#@%!" at the top of my lungs... but realized I was in an office full of people, so I bit my tongue and screamed "BOOGER!" instead.
I have no idea why it was that particular word which popped into my head to scream.
I can only guess that I was having some kind of Loni Anderson breasts-induced flashback or something.
And now I get to pack up and go home, praying to the internet gods that Verizon is through dicking around with my DSL. I need to catch up on the hundreds of emails and thousands of blog entries that have undoubtedly piled up since I lost my connection Sunday afternoon. I swear, my DSL goes down more often than Monica Lewinsky in the White House.
Booger.
Lastly... color me shocked.
Not.
First of all, to anybody watching How I Met Your Mother last night, you should know that the idea of putting a skyscraper in Spokane is laughable. The tallest building there now is like twenty stories or so, which means a skyscraper dropped in the city would be kind of ridiculous. Secondly, for anybody who watched The Class after How I Met Your Mother had aired... WHY?!? OH LORD, WHY?? I've seen bad television before, but this is borderline tragic. I cannot fathom how The Class was ever greenlit (it makes the awful Help Me Help You look brilliant). I am worried that HIMYM ratings are going to suffer because of its crappy lead-out, and hope that they cancel this steaming pile and put on something funny.
For my own amusement, Spokane's new skyline with a skyscraper inserted...
Pre-altered photo © Rob Niebrugge and stolen from his cool Niebrugge Images site.
Wow. That's actually pretty cool. I never realized how badly Spokane needs a skyscraper.
For years now my deepest most secret fantasy has been to see Veronica Mars performing a faux-lesbian 3-way dance with two hot blondes at a drunken frat party. Now that fantasy has become a reality thanks to last night's episode... well, I honestly don't know what to do with myself. Just die happy, I guess.
Which goes to prove... just when you think that Veronica Mars can't get any better, something like this comes along to change your mind...
More sweet Veronica screencap hotness can be found at vm-caps.
I like to think that the cast wrap-party for each episode of Veronica Mars is much like this... but with a hot-tub full of lime
Wow. As far as wacky Google searches go, this entry may actually surpass the time I talked about having drunken sex with coked-up hookers while a pizza delivery boy spread peanut butter on my ass!
I received an email this morning criticizing both me and my blog and so I did what I usually do when this happens... lock myself in my bathroom and cry for five hours.
Well, not really, because when you put yourself out on the internet like this, you learn very quickly to ignore the dumbasses and morons that feel the need rain shit on your day. I gave up caring what people think about me decades ago, so criticism from faceless idiots on the internet mean about as much to me as navel lint.
But now I've found an even better way of dealing with such nonsense than simply ignoring it:
TIME-SENSITIVE CONTEXT!
Oddly enough, it was watching an episode of Little House on the Prairie that brought about this revelation*.
When I heard Pa Ingalls say something like "that's a fine-looking boy you've got there," I assumed it to be an innocent compliment because of time-sensitive context. Back in pioneer days you could say stuff like this and not be pegged as a freaky child molester. Today if a guy were to say this about a little boy, people would call for the police.
And it works the other way too. A long time ago you could see a painting, say it was "awful," and the artist would thank you for the compliment since the time-sensitive context of "awful" meant "full of awe" back then. Today if you say a painting is "awful" the artist will lock himself in the bathroom and cry for five hours because it meant you didn't like it.
Just five years ago if somebody wrote to me and said "DUDE, YOU ARE TOTALLY SICK!! YOUR BLOG IS WICKED SICK TOO!" it would mean that they thought both me and my blog were perverted and grotesque. But if somebody wrote that to me NOW, the time-sensitive context has shifted and it means that they think both me and my blog are insanely cool.
And since this trend shows no sign of stopping, I figure why wait? I am going to start applying FUTURE-SENSITIVE CONTEXT to any criticism or negativity that comes my way from now on.
Somebody calls me an "asshole"? I choose to believe that in the future "asshole" will come to mean "kind and generous."
Somebody says my blog is "f#@%ing stupid"? I choose to believe that in the future "f#@%ing stupid" will come to mean "amazing and brilliant."
With this in mind, here is the email I received with future-sensitive context applied...
Hey you kind and generous person!
I just ran across your amazing and brilliant blog and think you are a down-to-earth and observant individual who should be showered with praise and worship! If you think you are so humble and respectful then why don't you go buy a treat for yourself! You deserve what you get!!!!
People like you are creating a better world for all of us and make me feel insanely cool!!
I hope you have a long and happy life!!
See?? By using the magic of future-sensitive context, even horrible hate-mail can be made into a wonderful and life-afirming statement of love and support! Sometimes it's not how the world looks at you, but how you look at the world.
* Don't ask me why I was watching Little House on the Prairie. In my defense, I was waiting for my clothes to get out of the dryer and it happened to be on the television when I turned it on.
WAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!
It's apple harvest season in the valley, which means that it must be time for the annual gnat plague which descends on us like the wrath of Lindsay Lohan's crotch.
The tiny bastards only live for a few days, but they make the most of what little time they have by being as annoying as possible. Just walking out to your car results in your being covered with bugs that can't be brushed off without smooshing their little carcasses into your clothing. Don't even get me started about the perils of breathing... having a gnat fly in your mouth or up your nose causes a major freak-out that'll ruin your day in a hurry.
I spend most of my time screaming like a little bitch and waving my arms around whenever I go outside...
Gnats suck ass!
Much like the television show Lost, but without the benefit of a short life span. Quite the opposite really... the shit just drags on and on and on. After giving up on the show, my friends kept insisting that things were different this third season and it's totally great now.
I believed them and watched the current episode.
My friends are lying bastards.
RULE TO GOOD TELEVISION #1: When you come up with a plot twist, the final result had damn well be better than the red herring you discarded. Back when I was watching, there were polar bears on the tropical island. It was strongly alluded to that the strangely misplaced bears were created by the mental powers of creepy little Walt. That would have been cool. But it turns out that the bears escaped from an old zoo on the other side of the island. Yeah, that's kind of lame.
Just like everything else on the show.
Two years later and nothing has really been wrapped up (except the polar bears, of course). They've just added more crap to an already convoluted mess. At its core, Lost is still the same mix of boring flashbacks (Sun and Jun had a terrible marriage... WE GET IT!!) and plot points (Dharma Project, The Others, Will Kate Choose Jack or Sawyer?) and stuff they've forgotten (smoke monsters, giant tree-crushing monsters, and just about everything else).
Yawn.
Want to impress me? WRAP IT UP! Answer ALL the questions and tie up ALL the loose ends... then come up with something that's MORE bad-ass and mysterious to keep the show interesting. Because hey, it works for Veronica Mars. Of course, with Veronica Mars, even THAT isn't good enough... they have to go back into already solved mysteries and make it so that everything you thought you knew was wrong! Genius!
But since that doesn't seem to be an option for this hideously bad show, I won't be tuning in to Lost again (nor any of the lamer next-gen imitators like Heroes, The Nine, Six Degrees, and whatnot). Large casts of inexplicably-connected people trying to solve mysteries that are never actually solved is not good television, it's just annoying.
Like the gnats.
I'd scream like a little bitch and wave my arms around if I thought it would help, but blogging about it is so much easier.
Halfway through each month, I have an alarm set so I will remember to check my server stats and see if I need to be offloading some bandwidth. This ensures that I won't overrun my limit and have to pay pay pay. Fortunately, there are some very kind and generous people out there who donate bandwidth when I need it... if I remember to use it.
Anyway, for the first time in years, unique visitor counts for Blogography went down. It was bound to happen eventually... I was expecting it to happen... but I still admit to being surprised. Apparently nobody loves me any more.
Well, 1.2% of the people who used to love me don't love me any more.
I should have never put up those pictures of Lindsay Lohan.
It's a good thing I am not a stats whore or I might have to do something drastic, like post those amateur porn videos I made when I was young and needed the money. Nothing makes visitor counts skyrocket like amateur porn! Well, except professional porn. I suppose if I drop another 5% I'll have to look into turning pro. Nothing quite like whoring myself out to keep my -ahem- stats up.
Speaking of surprises... I rented a Samuel L. Jackson film I somehow overlooked called The 51st State which had the amazing Emily Mortimer as a bitchin' lady-assassin who likes to drive motorcycles and kill people. In other words, she's the perfect woman...
The movie was okay, but not nearly as good as the other Emily Mortimer film I recently saw... a sappy drama called Dear Frankie. This flick also stars Gerard Butler who, in turn, is starring in the most eagerly anticipated film of next year... 300, which is based on Frank Miller's awesome graphic novel of the same name. It looks amazing. An even better adaptation than Sin City, if you can believe it...
The totally bitchin' sneak preview trailer (along with a nifty making-of featurette) is available at Apple in delicious hi-def QuickTime. For those of you who (like me) fell totally in love with Miller's graphic novel, there's a very cool comparison between the film and book here. Even if you aren't interested in 300, it's still worth checking out.
And now I'm off to "research" my pending porn star career...
It would seem that bullet-points on Sunday is getting to be a tradition. Rather than fight it, I've chosen to embrace it. From now on, I'll save up all my bullet point crap during the week for Sunday. Easy.
• There's a nifty (but too short) interview with god Steve Jobs over at Newsweek. His assessment of Microsoft's incredibly fugly media player is priceless. When asked if he was concerned about the "wireless connectivity" functionality of Zune, Jobs replies: "I've seen the demonstrations on the Internet about how you can find another person using a Zune and give them a song they can play three times. It takes forever. By the time you've gone through all that, the girl's got up and left! You're much better off to take one of your earbuds out and put it in her ear. Then you're connected with about two feet of headphone cable." — I think I laughed for ten solid minutes after reading that.
• My favorite comic book series of all time is Superboy and The Legion of Super-Heroes. I still remember the first time I discovered it, which was in a series of Whitman/Gold Key reprint 3-Packs at the local SafeWay. The issues that hooked me were the first I read, #255-257. I then spent years filling in my collection all the way back to Superboy #197 which was when "Legion" got added to the title (not a mean feat for a kid on a fixed allowance in middle-school!). Anyway, WB Kids has created a Legion cartoon, which is surprisingly good...
Superboy is called Superman for some kind of stupid legal reason, but is portrayed perfectly. My favorite character in the cartoon is Brainiac 5, which they have changed into a full-fledged robot. I should hate that (he's humanoid in the comic), but he's just so cool that I can't manage it! If you like cartoons, you should check it out Saturday mornings.
• I watched a great show on The Science Channel called "Building the Ultimate... A Giant Out of Water" which was about the construction of Hong Kong's New International Airport. One of my regrets in life was that I never got to fly into Hong Kong's old Kai-Tak Airport on the infamous "13 Approach" (which you can read about on Wikipedia). Once they moved to the new airport, that thrill-ride was closed forever. I think that this show is actually a series, but The Science Channel's website sucks so much ass that I couldn't find out for sure. I searched for several minutes, but the site kept popping up empty windows (via Flash, because I have pop-up blocking on) and giving me errors. Why bother to have a site at all if it's totally useless?
• I love standup comedy, and am totally addicted to Comedy Central Presents. I've discovered so many talented comics on this show, including Mike Birbiglia, Nick Swardson, Kyle Cease, Stephen Lynch, and many others. Great, great shows. So where the f#@% are the DVDs?? You can get a few of the shows at the iTunes Store, but where are the DVD sets? This is a completely missed opportunity, because if they were priced fairly, they'd sell huge.
• In other "I wish it were on DVD news" I just saw Richard Grieco's If Looks Could Kill for the hundredth time on television. How can such a funny movie which has memorable characters by Linda Hunt, Roger Rees, and Gabrielle Anwar not be released? I want a Special Edition Director's Cut double-DVD set loaded with extras and complete cast/director commentary... yesterday.
• Betty White made a welcome (if unexpected) cameo in last week's Boston Legal that was pretty cool. I wish I could find a screen cap to post, because she totally steals the show without even saying a word! I've said it many times, but Betty White kicks ass. UPDATE: Got em'!
• Even NBC must be realizing how much the current season of Saturday Night Live is sucking ass, because they didn't even show a new episode last night. Instead, they repeated a sweet episode with Kate Hudson and Radiohead that had Will Ferrell's flawless impersonation of James Lipton from Inside the Actor's Studio. And, as an apology for just how bad SNL is sucking, they are also starting to release complete seasons of the show on DVD (with musical guests!!). I am so going bankrupt buying all these sets.
• Lastly, if you want your mind blown, here's a cool presentation in Flash of "Imagining the Tenth Dimension."
Well that was relatively painless. Look for all new bullets next Sunday.
About the only thing I want more than for Jeremy Piven's Cupid to be released on DVD is Nintendo's new Wii gaming console. As more and more footage of gameplay with the Wii controller is released, I just get more and more anxious to have one. The only problem being that I will never have time to play it. Case in point: as excited as I was for Lego StarWars 2 to be released a month ago, I've only had the chance to play it once.
Yet, as sad as this is, my enthusiasm is not diminished...
I think that if they were to come out with "Lego Star Wars Light Saber Duel" for Wii, I would probably have to stop working, sell all my possessions, then move into a studio apartment that had nothing more than a couch, a television, TiVo, a DVD player, and Wii.
I guess if you had to say goodbye to your life, that's not a half-bad way of doing it.
Though, to truly make the experience complete, they'd have to come out with "Wii Virtual Hooker." If I had that and Pizza Hut delivery, I'd never have to leave the house again.
Bleh. I need a nap...
I'm hungry.
And it's not the kind of hungry where you just eat something to make it go away. It's the kind of hungry where you are more interested in the experience of eating than just having a full stomach. At times like this my mind starts racing with memorable culinary experiences I've had, followed by an incessant need to list some of them (which I will, in an extended entry), followed by the sadness I feel over writing about food I've enjoyed when so many people in this world go hungry... really hungry... every day...
My McChicken reminder of Happy Meals and hunger.
Hmmm... errr... uhhh... if anybody knows of a good way to seamlessly transition from talking about food to talking about urinal cakes, please let me know. In the meanwhile, I'll do what I usually do, and use the "blunt force" method which involves simply starting a new paragraph.
What is the deal with urinal cakes being PINK? And it's not even a manly kind of pink... it more of a feminine pink that you'd find on panties (not that I am claiming to actually own any of these panties) or a little girl's bedspread (not that I am claiming to be uncomfortably familiar with little girl's bedding preferences)...
Every time I step up to a urinal and find a little pink hockey puck floating in the bottom, I want to scream at the injustice of it all. Urinal cakes should be BLUE... or maybe even GREEN... but not yellow and certainly never, EVER, pink. If I were forced to choose between a bathroom which smelled like rancid urine and one that had pretty pink pellets in the urinal, I'D CHOOSE THE RANCID URINE SMELL EVERY TIME!! It may be unpleasant, odor-wise, but at least I won't have to suffer the indignity of having what little manhood I posses assaulted by girlie urinal cakes.
Anyway, if you have any appetite left at all, a partial list of favorite food experiences are in an extended entry...
→ Click here to continue reading this entry...
Fun! On the way home from work I was nearly run over by a stupid bitch who thought that talking on her mobile phone was more important than watching the road. I almost wish that she had, because having to come home and watch @%^#*!'s collection of complete crap win Project Runway had me praying for death.
This morning I received an email from a nice reader who has spent the last month reading Blogography ("a monthly archive every morning!"). After saying some very nice things that I am too modest to reprint (summary: I totally kick ass!), this reader asked a question I found quite interesting: "How did Bad Monkey lose all that weight?"
Because, if you look at the DaveToons over the years, it's quite a change...
The answer can be found in Bad Monkey's new book...
It turns out that Bad Monkey owes much of the success of his astounding weight loss to Jared Fogle.
Yes, that Jared Fogle... the Subway Sandwich whore.
But not in the way that you think.
You see, what Bad Monkey did was record all those stupid-ass Jared commercials, then mount a television and video player on top of his toilet tank. That way after every meal he could run to the bathroom, watch Subway commercials, and puke his guts out.
Because every time Jared comes out and compares an anemic Subway sandwich with NO mayonnaise and NO cheese to a Big Mac or something, I know it makes ME want to puke. It would be different if Jared were to simply say "I lost a lot of weight by eating right & exercising, and Subway was a part of that" — but he doesn't. Instead he comes out as a prostitute for Subway and and slams other restaurants like a whore. Why don't you compare a crappy Subway sandwich to a McDonalds salad? Or an Arby's Market Fresh sandwich with NO mayo and NO cheese? Or even a Quizno's sandwich with NO mayo and NO cheese?
What a f#@%ing tool.
And then the douchebag writes a "motivational self-help book." I haven't read it, but I sincerely doubt that it says "be a total whore by taking money to say whatever the company paying you tells you to say." Jared ate at Subway because he lived above a Subway restaurant. The fact that he decided to lose weight had nothing to do with Subway. It had everything to do with finally deciding to eat right. Because I can go into a Subway right now and order a sandwich with triple cheese and extra mayo just as easily as I can order one without.
I've taken some crap from people who think that I'm a dick for picking on somebody as "inspirational" as Jared. Well I think he's a dick for bashing other restaurants with nonsensical comparisons because somebody pays him to, and then acts like he's a hero by trotting out his old big-ass pants and telling people the key to losing weight is eating at Subway.
The only thing Jared inspires me to do is buy his book so I can wipe my ass with the pages.
Bad Monkey doesn't wipe or he would too.
WARNING... Project Runway season finale spoilerage in the comments...
My day started with a trip to the dentist for my 6-month cleaning, and only went downhill from there. By the time I finished work at 8:00pm, I was so sick and tired of life that I was seriously contemplating taking a handful of sleeping pills and crawling into bed. But that seemed kind of stupid... how much worse could the day get at 8:00pm? Because, hey, Ugly Betty, My Name is Earl, The Office, Grey's Anatomy, and CSI are on tonight!
So I plop myself down in front of the television in anticipation of good TV.
Instead I am inundated with stupid-ass political advertising for an hour. I'm guessing it's the same everywhere but, here in Washington State, it's particularly nasty because of the senatorial race. Heaven only knows I'm not a big fan of incumbent Maria Cantwell... but Mike McGavick and his never-ending attack ads is no better. Politicians don't inspire anymore. They just sling mud. They're not interested in solving problems. They're only interested in getting elected.
It just makes me want to bitch-slap them both.
But what's the point? They're doing far worse to each other...
Who wins in these things? No matter which one gets the office, I'm mortally embarrassed to have them as our senator.
I'm too depressed to blog anymore, so I'm stealing a meme from Kentucky Girl which you can find in an extended entry after this really cute picture of me as a tyke...
My hairstyle hasn't changed in decades... there's just less of it!
I've just been abducted by aliens.
And by aliens, of course, I mean the bitches on The View.
I recorded the show a few days ago because Bill O'Reilly was a guest. Not that I like Bill O'Reilly or anything... actually, I think the dumbass is a perfect "10" on the "Are You a Dick?" scale...
No, the reason I recorded it was because the idea of Bill O'Reilly being in the same room with Rosie O'Donnell was guaranteed fun. Talk about two people on the opposite end of the political nut-job spectrum! I fully expected that I would witness Rosie putting her fist through Bill's head, and that was worth the space on my TiVo.
Holy crap. How do people watch this show? You can't understand a frickin' word, because Rosie, Babwa, Joy, and Elisabeth are screeching at the top of their lungs... ALL AT THE SAME TIME! Nobody shuts the f#@% up for five seconds so you can hear what is being said. I actually ended up feeling sorry for Bill O'Reilly, and I never thought I'd be saying that.
Still. I must admit to being mildly entertained and unable to turn away from this car wreck of a show. Elizabeth (isn't she that chick from Survivor?) is even more annoying than Debbie Matenopoulos!
Fortunately I was able to escape The View with a minimum of anal probing and my sanity in tact.
Barely.
Did anybody teach these bitches not to interrupt when somebody else is speaking? Sheesh.
I live in constant fear of cauliflower.
And broccoli too, but mostly cauliflower because it looks more like a human brain. Although if I stop and think about it, broccoli should be more scary because it's like a green alien brain or something.
Every once in a while I have nightmares where I am being chased by a head of cauliflower which has grown to a giant size by sucking out human brains. Eventually the evil cauliflower traps me in a dead-end alley and there's nowhere to run. I pull out a gun and start firing at the vegetable hellspawn, only to find out that he is bullet-proof...
Then, just as the cauliflower is about to eat my brain, I wake up.
And I smell cauliflower.
But then I realize that I farted in my sleep, and that's what caused the nightmare.
Which makes me wonder why people would eat something that smells like farts in the first place.
Anyway...
Tonight I was watching a Steven Wright stand-up special on Comedy Central. The final break had a new Subway commercial where Jared the Subway Sandwich Whore trotted out subs with 6 grams of fat each and compared them to a "Burger King Stacker" which has 54 grams of fat because it's piled high with beef and bacon. FOR THE LAST TIME YOU STUPID F#@%... IF YOU WERE CONCERNED ABOUT FAT WHILE EATING AT BURGER KING, YOU WOULDN'T BUY THE FATTIEST THING ON THE MENU!! Why doesn't Burger King have a commercial where somebody comes out and compares a BK Veggie sandwich with 8 grams of fat to a Subway Spicy Italian Sub with extra cheese and mayo which has 305 grams of fat?? F#@% Subway. And double-f#@% that moron Jared Fogle. He has got to be the biggest douchebag asshole on the face of the planet. I'd like to strangle the idiot with his giant pair of f#@%ing pants and then deep-fry his f#@%ing head...
Then I'd make my own television commercial where I would compare Jared's fat head to a Subway Meatball Sub sandwich. They appear to be equal in brain cell grams.
• Despite having way too much work, I made time to go see The Prestige, because it's a film by Christopher Nolan. I thought his Batman Begins was the best of all Batman fims. Insomnia was a little dull, but still a good movie. Memento was sheer genius, and I've lost count the number of times I've seen it. I had high hopes for The Prestige, and was not disappointed. The film, much like a magic trick, is a delicate balance. The trick is putting in enough clues to make the viewer have an idea of what's happening, but not so many that the viewer figures it out too early. Sadly (just like The Sixth Sense) I had everything figured out before the end, but managed to enjoy the film quite a lot anyway. I wish I could detach myself from movies like this enough to get fooled, but it doesn't ever seem to be...
The Prestige is a film about rival magicians (played by Hugh Jackman & Christian Bale) and their ever-escalating obsession to be the best. Along the way there are some surprising turns, shocking twists, and clever casting (David Bowie?). This is one of my favorite films this year (despite being inexplicably slow in parts). I was surprised to see that it was based on a book by Christopher Priest, who wrote the totally brilliant book The Affirmation which I read years ago. To say I'm dying to read the original novel after seeing the movie is an understatement.
• Speaking of totally brilliant books, I've been reading my new DC Absolute Edition of Neil Gaiman's The Sandman. The volume is absolutely beautiful (looking much like Destiny's tome!) and has raised the bar for future Absolute releases. I've read that eventually all Sandman books will be given the Absolute treatment (four volumes in all) and hope that this includes the Death mini series... Chris Bachalo's stunning art would be amazing when blown up to a larger size! Highly recommended.
• In other movie news, I finally ended up renting Bride & Prejudice (the Indian remake of Pride & Prejudice) so I could see the brutally hot Aishwarya Rai in an English film because, well, damn...
I'm not much into musicals, but having the delicious Miss Rai around made up for a lot of cheesy song and dance numbers. One surprise... Naveen Andrews has a notable role that is very different than the brooding Sayid on Lost.
• As if Washington State's absurd "Say WA Campaign" wasn't embarrassing enough... Seattle has a new campaign of absurdity all its own... "Metronatural" for which they spent a hefty $200,000 and SIXTEEN MONTHS to come up with. And now they're going to blow $300,000 promoting it, which is odd, because I'd spend $600,000 to erase all traces of it ever existing (assuming I had $600,000 burning a hole in my pocket). What the heck does "Metronatural" say about Seattle? How is "Metronatural" going to inspire anybody to see Seattle? It's utterly bizarre, and sounds badly dated. The sad thing here is that Seattle is a remarkable city with a lot going for it, and I worry that "Metronatural" may actually have the opposite effect of scaring people away.
• My ENORMOUS PHONE is starting to go flaky, which means it's time to look for a new mobile. That's kind of a bummer, because I thought I'd have time to wait for Apple's iPhone to debut. But with no release date in sight, I've had to look elsewhere. At first I wanted the beautiful new Motorola KRZR, but that was before I found the ultra-sweet LG Migo...
How cool is that? It looks kind of like Shrek! So I get all excited and am determined to get one when I read on and find out that it is a phone for kids, and doesn't allow you to dial anything except four pre-programmed numbers and 911. How crappy is that? So now I am going to have to find something else. Bummer.
• After watching a few snippets of Kylie Minogue's Showgirl concert on BBC America and writing about it, I decided to take up the advice in my reader comments and rent the DVD. It was... uhhhhh... interesting. Mostly because Kylie is a very entertaining performer... but more so because the show has obviously been created for an audience of women and gay men. There is so much man-candy piled on her stage that I turned at least 10% more gay just from having watched it...
There's also quite a bit of Kylie's remarkable =ahem= assets shown as well, so all is not lost...
OMG! Aren't those red shoes just like totally the most fabulous thing ever? I'd kill or die to have the calves you need to pull off that look!
Uhhhhh... okay... maybe that would be 15%...
♫ "Won't come back from Dead Man's Corn! ♫
Today I was at the grocery store about to pick up a box of "Orville Redenbacher's Movie Theater Butter Microwave Popping Corn" when I started freaking out because I suddenly realized that Orville Redenbacher is dead.
And then I started seeing dead people everywhere... Betty Crocker... Chef Boyardee... even that Sun-Maid Raisin Girl would be about 100 years old now, so she's probably dead too.
Granted, Orville Redenbacher always looked half-dead (and a little evil?) anyway, but Betty Crocker and the Sun-Maid Girl are HOT! I haven't made up my mind about Chef Boyardee, but I think he's kind of hot too...
I don't know about Mr. Clean, The Morton Salt Girl, and the Gorton Fisherman because I try not to clean with harsh chemicals, avoid added sodium in my high-sodium butter-popcorn diet, and don't eat fish.
Back to my quest for excellence in popcorn, raisins, canned pasta, and cake mix... I have no doubt that while these people were alive, they gainfully supervised over their respective foods with dedication and care. That's how they became famous icons with popular products. But what about now that they're gone? Who's minding the store?
Just to be safe, I passed over Orville Redenbacher and went for Pop Secret brand popping corn.
Only to find out that it is made by Betty Crocker. Or, to be accurate, somebody POSING as the deceased Mrs. Crocker.
So then I put that box back and decided to grab a box of Act II EXTREME BUTTER popping corn.
Only to realize that Act II is a brand in the ConAgra Foods stable of products... which also includes Chef Boyardee and Orville Redenbacher foods. MORE DEAD PEOPLE!
WTF?!? So I put back the Act II (which was kind of sad, because EXTREME BUTTER looked pretty tasty) and decided to go with Jolly Time brand popcorn. It sounds like a very happy popcorn to eat, and I can find no trace of dead people on the box. Except buying this brand is really difficult because there are like... fifty different kinds of buttery popcorn they sell...
When did shopping for popcorn get to be so much work?
From now on I'm buying generic SafeWay brand foods. It's dead-free, and "safe" is in the name!
I finally got around to watching last night's Studio 60 and... wow... things are finally getting good. Every episode just gets better and better, which is ironic because they're pre-empting it next week and probably canceling the week after that. Typical. Shows never get a chance to find their footing anymore. It's either a hit out of the gate or it's cancelled.
Today I had a meeting in Seattle, but first I had to scrape ice off my windshield. It was a moment of profound depression, because it means that summer is officially over, fall has come, and winter is just around the corner. Things didn't get any better as it dumped rain all the way over the pass and all the way back.
The only thing that's kept me going was knowing that there's a fresh episode of Veronica Mars on tonight.
Which begins in a scant seven minutes, so I'll be signing off now.
But what do I do tomorrow when my windshield is freshly iced and I have to wait a week for new Veronica?
Something tells me cookies* will be involved.
* And by cookies, I mean porn.**
** Okay, that's not true. It's going to be actual cookies.***
*** But I wouldn't be surprised if porn shows up somewhere along the way.
Nothing interesting happened today.
I was rudely awakened at 3:30am by some idiot hammering on metal outside my window, then couldn't go back to sleep. I hoped filling out a meme would make me sleepy but all it did was make my brain go numb (which, I suppose, is a meme's entire purpose). Unable to get any much-needed rest, I decided to start in on my work.
And that's all I did for the entire day. Work. Right up until now (which is 10:30pm).
You'd think that I got a lot accomplished today but you would be wrong. I'm just as buried as ever, and will undoubtedly be working this weekend to try and get caught up. I'm turning into a work-zombie...
And now, since I am falling asleep at the keyboard, here's that meme I filled out this morning which I've seen floating around various places, but picked up from Adena...
→ Click here to continue reading this entry...
This morning a piece of spam somehow managed to get past both my spam service and my local spam filter. This happens every once in a while, but usually not when it has a subject line that reads "Make your penis the happiest penis in the world with Penis Adam & Eve Penis Pump!" I guess that the overuse of the word "penis" must have crashed the system or something.
I don't know which is worse... that spam is intruding on my inbox, or that my penis may be unhappy because I haven't purchased him a penis pump. And since my penis and I stopped speaking months ago, I don't really know how to inquire about that...
But I can't think about my penis just now, because I just retrieved a very disturbing voicemail from my parole officer today.
Apparently, I have 24 hours of community service left to turn in or else I won't be released from probation, and she's going to recommend that my term be extended six months to a year! This upsets me quite a lot because I've been so busy lately, and haven't had time to put in any community service hours. She then goes on to tell me "you need to call me TOMORROW, Jose, or else we won't have time to resolve this before your court date."
Huh? Jose?
My name isn't Jose. It's Dave.
And then I remember that I don't have a parole officer, nor am I under a community service order. I've never been caught for any of my crimes.
I guess I should call Jose's parole officer tomorrow and tell her that she left a message at the wrong number or else Jose is going to be in trouble... errr... going to be in more trouble.
In better news today (not involving my penis or a parole officer) my copy of Depeche Mode's Touring the Angel: Live in Milan arrived. I managed to snag the digipack version which includes a DVD of the concert, CD of selected tracks, and a bonus DVD for $8.79 at Half.com, a total bargain! I then did what I always do when I get a new Depeche Mode DVD... I watched ALL of my DM concert videos in sequence so I can listen to how their performance changes over the years. Touring the Angel is pretty darn good (I went and saw it live in Chicago with Kapgar last year), but not quite as good as 101 and Devotional which are tied for my all-time favorite.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to sit down and have a talk with my penis before retiring for the evening.
Okay. For everybody who became gravely concerned about Jose from yesterday's entry, I called back his parole officer and let her know that she had left her message at the wrong number. She promised to get ahold of him at school, so I think everything will be okay. Who you should really be concerned about is me, because I still consider it to be a small miracle that I didn't have an immediate nervous breakdown after receiving a voicemail that started out with "this is your parole officer..." Given the state of my memory lately, I fully admit that it took a minute before I realized that it was a wrong number call. Time to start taking ginkgo biloba, I guess.
Anyway...
After a long absence, I've finally manage to get Audio Scrobbler installed on my new Mac Pro and Powerbook. For those not in the know, this is a piece of software that connects you with the wonderful Last.fm music site over the internet. This allows you to keep track of your music listening habits, find other users with music tastes similar to yours, discover new artists with music recommendations and much, much more. It is an amazing service that's totally FREE to use, or you can choose to pay a measly $3 a month for a bunch of cool extra features.
Just for fun, I've created a new "Last.fm Group" for Blogography readers so, if you use the service, feel free to join up...
To see my Last.fm Music Profile, you can click here.
To see the Blogography Last.fm Group, you can click here.
I spent most of the afternoon attempting to get my Windows PC running again. I finally just had to re-install the Windows OS... again... which is always an ass-load of fun. Now everything is working, but it's put me in a really bad mood. It was made even worse when I found out that Blogography doesn't render properly in Explorer anymore. I have no idea what's going on there, but I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. Windows sucks ass.
Which is why I've been playing with the Ubuntu Linux OS...
I must say, I'm impressed. It installs like a dream, works beautifully, feels snappy, and is totally FREE! So far I've got it installed on both an old PowerPC Mac and an old Wintel box, and it runs great. If all I needed was to surf the web, write email, and create an occasional word processing document, or spreadsheet or whatever, I could totally switch no problem. But too much of what I do can't be done on Ubuntu (yet) so it's going to have to remain an interesting diversion for the time being.
I can easily see Ubuntu making wide deployment into office environments though, because you just can't beat the price. You've got pretty much everything you need (including Open Office, the MS Office clone), and other nifty open-source apps like Scribus (for page layout) and Quantus Plus (for web site creation) are only going to push things further as they mature. In another couple of years, Ubuntu is going to be on equal footing with Macs and PCs which has got to be making some people very nervous.
"I'm a leaf on the wind... watch how I soar..."
• Clerks 2 finally has a DVD ship date here in the States of November 28th. The release is packed with six hours of bonus features (including an extended version of the infamous "donkey scene") but the highlight is bound to be the cast commentary, just as it has been in all the previous Kevin Smith DVDs. Upon reflection, I'm thinking that Clerks 2 was one of my favorite films of the year (certainly the funniest so far), and I'm anxious to give it another viewing because the three times I saw it in the theater wasn't enough. Also being released on the 28th is "An Evening with Kevin Smith 2: Evening Harder" which is guaranteed fun.
• Speaking of Kevin, he has a new weekly video show at mtvU called Sucks Less With Kevin Smith. I was really looking forward to seeing it... until I found out that it requires Windows Digital Rights Management, and won't play on a Mac. Sucks less? I can't think of anything that sucks MORE. I find it shocking that Kevin Smith would be party to this stupid shit! Why not release the videos DRM-free on his blog so everybody can enjoy them? Stuff like this has me wondering what would happen if other vbloggers were as short-sighted. What would I do without The Show by Ze Frank, for example?
• Speaking of suckage, I'm still waiting for my Milwaukee Admirals' team jersey. They sent me one, but it wasn't personalized like I ordered it. I thought it would be replaced by now, but a month has passed and nothing. I'm a little bummed about that. I hope it arrives before my trip to Wisconsin so I can be totally awesome...
"For the last time, those aren't hockey pucks!"
• Speaking of totally awesome, the new Hellboy animated film, Sword of Storms has finally aired on Cartoon Network. It was really well done, beautifully animated, and featured most of the actors from the film reprising their roles (Selma Blair!). As a Helboy fan from day one, I couldn't be happier...
If you don't get Cartoon Network, you'll be happy to know that a DVD will be released next February. If you can't wait that long and are looking for some interesting reading, I highly recommend the Hellboy Animated Production Diary, which offers insight into the labor of love that goes into creating good animation. I was totally addicted to it, and couldn't stop until I had devoured every entry.
• Speaking of totally addicted, I am going nuts over Last.fm since re-installing it the other day. First of all, I've been buying music like crazy as I discover brilliant stuff I have somehow missed. Second, I've been rediscovering old favorites I haven't listened to in ages. And third, I am freaking out over Blogography Group Radio which compiles musical favorites from readers who have joined. It's a cool mash-up of stuff I know and like, stuff I never expected to like, and stuff I've never even heard of before. There's 17 members so far, and the resulting charts are interesting, to say the least! What an amazing, amazing service. If you like music and haven't tried Last.fm, you owe it to yourself to have a look. When I re-do the site once "Pink for October" is over in a few days, I'll be putting up a chart from my user profile right in the sidebar.
• Speaking of "Pink for October," it was my intention to raffle a big prize package this month, then sell out my entire inventory of T-shirts and donate every penny of the profits to the Susan G. Koman Foundation for Breast Cancer. Unfortunately, I never got around to doing this because of numerous doctor visits for my eyesight problems and catching up with the work I missed because of them. This is something I still very much want to do, and plan to have the raffle ready when I return from Seattle next week. I hope everybody who liked the idea is still interested (even though Pink for October will have ended) because this is an incredibly worthy organization...
Dave & Bad Monkey love healthy boobies! Schedule your mammogram today!
• Speaking of incredibly worthy, Jenny has truly outdone herself in her latest entry at Run Jen Run. I leave you with my nomination for Blog Entry of The Year...
"In sooth, I know not why I am so hungry. It wearies me, this aching. But feed I must. Look ho! More dots, I spy."
With all haste I beseech you to click over to "Death of a Pacman: A Play in Five Acts" for the finest assemblage of dramatic prose and images I have yet seen!
Alas, there are no more bullets to dodge here until next Sunday!
I've never had a day go so wrong so quickly.
Things started off well enough this morning... as I was getting ready to leave the apartment, I noticed a little spider on my shoe. "Hello little spider," I said. Then I carefully hopped to the door on one foot, then down the stairs, and shook him off into a nice bush where he could live out his days undisturbed. Killing living creatures is far easier than the alternative, so I always feel happy about little things like this. As I pulled out of my driveway, I was actually in a good mood despite it being a Monday...
Until two minutes later when I got to the three-way stop on the way to work.
As I pulled up, there was a car just leaving to my right. I waited for him to exit the intersection and then pulled out because it was my turn to go.
Except some f#@%ing bitch behind him heard a train whistle and decided that she didn't want to get stuck at the train crossing. Oh no, she's too important for that. She decides she doesn't give a crap that it's MY F#@%ING TURN TO GO, and floors it into the intersection. This means I have to slam on my brakes which, in retrospect, pisses me off. I should have just plowed into her dumb-bitch ass and took the insurance claim. I clearly had the right-of-way, so she'd have to pay for it. Unless I killed her impatient ass, which would have been okay by me... I saved a spider this morning, so that's just balancing my karma.
But instead I rev up on her bumper and lay on my horn. I loathe the "c-word" but I was screaming it at the top of my lungs because the rage had totally blinded me at this point.
F#@%ING BITCH!!
Things just went downhill from there.
One of these days I am going to totally snap. Some asshole is going to pull something like this and I'm just going to go off the deep end. I'll follow them to wherever they're going, wait for them to get out of their car, and then run them down.
THEN BACK UP AND RUN THEM DOWN AGAIN JUST TO BE SURE THEY'RE DEAD!!! TOTALLY D-E-A-D, DEAD!!
It's going to take an entire week of meditation to get this out of my system and restore my wa...
Whereas by "wa" I am referring to that most Japanese of words meaning peace, harmony, balance, and calm.
I am NOT referring to the fact that I wa-wa-wanted to f#@%ing kill that bitch*.
*I want that on the record in case I "accidentally" happen to "run into" her tomorrow morning.
I have mixed feelings on Halloween.
On one hand, you've got little moron children dressing up in costumes and losing their frickin' minds. I'm sure this has been true since Trick-Or-Treating was invented because, well, children + free candy... you do the math. The problem is that now-a-days parents don't seem to give a crap about watching their kids. They're too busy talking on their mobile phones to supervise anything (not that they seem to give a crap in the first place). Usually you can do your best to avoid it, but on Halloween the little hellions show up on your doorstep. It's not like you can avoid that (at least not without having your car egged).
On the other hand, this is the one day I can be quasi-evil in public and get away with it.
In celebration of the day, I'm going to eat a bowl of candy for breakfast.