More Than Meets the Eye

2011-03-30T15:53:00.001-07:00

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It's Been A Year?

2010-11-14T10:04:00.000-08:00

Really? Holy cow does time fly! Ah well, lots of changes have been going on with me, so this will be the first in a series of posts (hopefully) talking about them.

Reflections on Planning a Wedding:

Planning a wedding is a pain in the ass. First of all, everything is expensive. Like, really expensive. Every time we went to buy something, I had to adjust what my opinion of "reasonable" was. It's like that old joke where a $1 pencil costs $5 at Disneyland; flowers only cost so much, but we'll triple that price if the word "wedding" is used! Awesome! It's like the worst type of Monopoly every because no matter what you do, it's always uber-expensive. There's a Catch-22 of getting married during a recession as well. On the upside, money is tight for businesses so they offer good deals: for example, the location of our wedding, Etiwanda Gardens, normally charged a 20% service fee for weddings. For us, it was dropped to 10%. Nice. On the flip-side, since it was a recession and my work had reduced my hours, the price cuts weren't as useful as we were still flat-ass broke anyway. It's still something to keep in mind though.

Second of all is trying to do it all yourself. Now, everyone (including me!) will offer to help you do whatever you need, but with very few exceptions, no one will. And part of that is out of necessity. When you decide to make all your centerpieces one random Friday night, there aren't always too many people who actually can help. But just as often, you would ask for help and no one would be able to. And I understand that. Everyone has busy lives and other schedules they have to meet, but just be prepared for it. The exception of course should be your Best Man. My Best Man was like an extension of my being - about as close to a clone as you could get. He handled shit. Especially as the wedding neared, if something needed doing, he was there to do it. Honestly, I'm not sure I could've survived it without him. And our wedding went smoothly! So choose wedding party members wisely, my friends.

The last is everyone's family. Families are families so they add stress without really meaning to. Daughters are being married away, sons are getting married, in-laws are being introduced, often family members who haven't seen each other in years are meeting. It's stressful. You're going to upset someone - probably lots of them. Just keep in mind that it's your wedding and if they don't like it they can get married themselves. Do your best not to piss anyone off too much, but don't sacrifice the wedding you want just to appease someone.

Overall, planning a wedding only reinforced my belief that weddings should last a lifetime. I mean, who would want to go through that all over again? Not me, that's for sure. Planning a wedding takes about 81,000 little details and despite all the online help and everything available, it's still a huge pain in the ass. My closing suggestions to anyone planning a wedding: Plan early, plan often, and when you procrastinate be ready to triage.

I'll talk about my actual wedding next time.

The NFL Sucks

2009-11-30T18:36:00.000-08:00

Wow. So I really want to like the NFL sometimes, but damn they make it hard (and no, college football isn't any better, but for multiple reasons). For example, tonight's Monday Night Football sounded like a great game: Patriots at Saints. The EVIL Pats against the unbeaten Saints. Good times. So I turn on the game toward the end of the first quarter and here, roughly, is what I watched:

Tom Brady interception
Turnover - commercials
Saints run two plays
End of 1st Quarter - commercials
Saints run two plays
Injury time out - commercials
Saints run two plays
Touchdown Saints - commercials
Kickoff
Commercials

And then I turned it off. When someone asks you what the hell is wrong with football, this right here is it. I am THE target demographic for the NFL and would want nothing more than to enjoy the game, but the amount of commercials is just ridiculous. And this wasn't even the end of the half!! This was just normal, average, ho-hum football the way it is aired today. And it sucks.

So thank you, NFL, for ensuring that I will avoid televised football as much as possible. Of the most egregious faults I have with football, this is by far the worst.

Welcome Back, NBA!

2009-10-28T07:44:00.000-07:00

The NBA season dawns upon us, and I couldn't be happier. Seriously, the four months or so between the end of the NBA Finals and the start of the season are way too long for me. As we start this NBA season, I want to look at what is it about the NBA that I enjoy so much, and what are some things I like less.

The first thing is the tempo of the game. In football, there are 40 seconds between plays. In baseball, there's almost that much time between pitches - and that's before the entire Yankees infield comes in to sing a chorus of Kum-by-ah in the rain during the 12th inning! That is just. Too. Damn. Slow. In contrast, sports like hockey and soccer feel too fast and out of control for me. As was said on "The West Wing" once, even the announcers seem surprised when there's a goal! In contrast, basketball is a high-paced sport but one that is under control (mostly). The pace can range drastically from the "Seven Seconds or Less," high-scoring New York Knicks to the slow, deliberate pace of the San Antonio Spurs. And the team that controls the pace has a huge advantage on the game!

The second is the team aspect of the sport. In fairness, other sports have this too, but I like it in those sports also. And for all the basketball haters who argue that the NBA has too many "me first" players and no one really plays "team" basketball, I challenge you to actually watch some good NBA teams. The Lakers won a championship last year playing the Triangle Offense, which is predicated on team play and cooperation. The Spurs, as much as I dislike them, are the epitome of team basketball. Teams that rely on one player - like LeBron James - often are stifled because team defenses are capable of stopping them. Watching an offense like the Lakers' last year is great to watch, as each player fills a role and does their job. It just makes the game pretty to watch.

Third is the amazing individual talent on the court. With only five players on the court for each team an individual player can have a dramatic effect on the game. When certain players (like Kobe Bryant, LeBron James or Dwayne Wade, for example) go into "Eff You" mode and just take over games, it is mesmerizing to watch. These players seem like they are in God Mode for a video game and are just unstoppable. It's a testament to their abilities and determination - and just tons of fun to watch.

So there are some of my favorite things about the NBA. Of course, there's plenty I don't care for, but we'll get to that in due time. For today, I'm just going to enjoy the game.

Iron Man Review

2009-07-13T08:12:00.001-07:00

Yes, I saw Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Yes, I will tell you all about it. But, as with any good show, before the Main Event there is always a preliminary event - in this case, my review of Iron Man.

I had heard many good things about Iron Man; so much so, that it created a certain amount of hype that it failed to live up to. It was a good movie, that I enjoyed, and really want to buy, but it had serious flaws, the most notable of which is that it was an origin movie. The first X-Men, Spider-Man and Batman movies all suffered of this flaw. It just can't be helped. Origin movies are forced to explain a large amount of information which tends to make the movie a little slow and/or boring. Ideally, a sequel - because it doesn't have as much necessary exposition - can be more exciting. This was the case in all of the above movie series, and I expect it to be so with Iron Man as well.

As for the movie content, it was - for the most part - very strong. Robert Downey Jr. was outstanding in his role as Tony Stark/Iron Man. I mean, just fantastic! He really controlled every scene he was in - as he should. In some ways, the characters of Stark and Bruce Wayne (Batman) are similar: both are rich inventors that live almost fake, playboy-esque lives while secretly being superheroes in the background. In this way I compared Downey's Stark with Christian Bale's Wayne (from Batman Begins and Dark Knight) and Robert Downey Jr. really comes away looking strong in that regard. He was more believable and enjoyable to watch in that role than Bale, and was clearly the best actor in the movie. It is no surprise that after Iron Man, Downey's career has been revitalized.

The supporting cast was similarly good to very good. Gweneth Paltrow in particular stood out as Pepper Potts. Most of the other cast members played their parts well - or at least didn't hurt the movie.

The effects and the suit were very pretty to watch. It didn't look overly fake (most of the time) and there was just enough banter in fight scenes to make it enjoyable. Sometimes too much talking can be distracting. As for the story; it was a typical superhero fare - and a standard Iron Man origin. The switch to Afghan terrorists (in the original comic - from the 1960s! - the Chinese had kidnapped Stark and induced him to create his armor) made the movie more modern and easy to relate to and the subtle hints to classic villains and other characters (Mandarin, Jarvis, War Machine) gave longtime fans something to enjoy without taking away from the main points of the movie.

Overall, if you enjoy superhero movies then this is a solid but not great movie. However, the characters are all well-established and a sequel, either in the form of a second Iron Man movie or an Avengers movie, will really allow for a much better movie.

Minor Changes

2009-07-13T07:52:00.001-07:00

Some of my intrepid reader(s?) may have noticed a few minor changes on the site, mostly a few advertisements everywhere. Fear not! This is simply my feeble attempt to cash in on my excellent blogging skills! I signed up for AdSense via Blogger, so if any of those ads look neat make sure to click on them so I can get paid!

2009-06-24T20:27:00.000-07:00

I was so uber-busy yesterday at work (no, really!) that I forgot to wish a Happy Birthday to my super-awesome fabulous amazingly beautiful fiance Brandy! She turned 26 yesterday, just as I did a month ago.

So a belated blog-wishing happy birthday Brandy!

The Weekend Re-visited

2009-06-22T08:55:00.001-07:00

I'm going to go back to trying to evaluate the best and worst parts of my weekend. Hopefully that will keep me encouraged to post. Hopefully.

So the highlight of my weekend was a wedding I went to for a buddy of mine. For starters, as Brandy and I plan our wedding, it is nice to see what others do to get ideas of what we both like and don't like. And as weddings go it was nice enough. The couple is obviously very much in love and so that is very nice to see. I've known the groom for almost 13 years so I'm very happy for him.

The wedding was in Temecula at Calvary Chapel which is in the wine country, so naturally Brandy and I took the opportunity to go wine tasting beforehand. Which was really the low point of my weekend. Not that the wine tasting per se was bad - it wasn't! - but it reminded me of how much I really like to go wine tasting and how much I miss being a wine club member and having the money to buy good wine regularly. *sigh* Ah well.

Next weekend's highlight: Seeing Transformers! WOO!

Update: And also, Happy Birthday to The Reva!!!!

The Rocks Haven't Crushed Me!

2009-06-21T10:53:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the delay faithful reader(s?) but I have returned and have not been crushed to death by rocks! So what have I been up to?

The most important change has been at my work. Last March (I haven't posted since March!! Ugh! I feel horrible now!), due to the economy, I was changed from a salary employee to an hourly one. Now, in some companies "hourly" isn't all that bad. For example, Brandy is hourly, but her schedule is fairly set, and she knows that she always works aournd 38-40 hours per week, depending on how long of lunches she takes and if she has to stay late or anything of that nature. In contrast, I can only charge for hours where I am billable, as in, working on an actual job, not just loafing around the office. So essentially I go in every morning and if there is any field work for me to do, I do it, and if not, I go home. This has caused a lot of volatility in my work schedule and quite a bit of stress with never knowing if I'm going to be working or not from day to day. On the other hand, given the choice between this and being unemployed, I'll take my current situation.

The other upside to this work situation is that I have occasionally been able to be at home on Brandy's days off and we've started getting some things orgainzed for the wedding. (I may be exaggerating slightly; "we" means mostly "her, with me tagging along and giving my opinion," and "getting...organized" means more of "started feeling extremely overwhelmed by all this crap, debated the merits of eloping and just began suffering through the rigors of planning." It's been fun. No, really, it has!) We've got our choice for location narrowed down, and will hopefully be making a final decision within a few weeks. I'll let everyone know. Once the place is secure we'll let everyone know the date. It's a lot of work, and we're just getting started, but hopefully we're starting early enough so that we don't go bat-shit crazy before the wedding trying to make everything work.

You also may have noticed - if you watch my Facebook page - that Brandy and I have started a diet (well, quasi-diet for me) on www.sparkpeople.com . It's a neat website that allows you to make meal plans and fitness workouts to aid you in getting or staying healthy. I would tell you more about it, but I'm hoping that Brandy will read this and be motivated to update her blog to tell you more about it. Hey, a guy can dream, right? Anyways, I joined both to help and support Brandy, as well as to start living healthier myself. I mean, it's not that I'm grotesquely out of shape or anything, but I thought I should get a jump start on changing my eating and fitness habits from "crazy college student" to "responsible adult" before my body begins breaking down.

I wish that I had cool stories to tell... but I don't. I pretty much work during the week and clean/play video games all weekend. I thoroughly enjoyed the beatdown the Lakers gave the entire NBA, though. And I loved the Nike MVP (Most Valuable Puppet) commercials.

I'll try to post more. I promise. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen comes out this week. I should be seeing it sometime before the end of next weekend, so I'll try to post about it's awesomeness.

World Champion Los Angeles Lakers

2009-06-15T07:06:00.001-07:00

Wow, it feels good to say that.

No Weekend Highs

2009-02-20T10:28:00.001-08:00

Well, I know it's Friday, and hopefully this weekend works out better, but last weekend there was no high. It was all low. As you may have read on Brandy's Facebook or MySpace her uncle that helped raise her and was like a father to her died very suddenly of a heart attack on Saturday evening. Everyone was quite shocked by it, and we are all still recovering. Ugh.

I suppose that the only (kinda) high of the weekend was my work. On Monday when I told them about it they agreed to give me Bereavement Pay, when, really, they didn't have to. So that was nice. Everything else, not so much.

Here's hoping things get better...

Weekend Notes

2009-02-03T07:06:00.000-08:00

Another week, another weekend:

The High: Going line dancing Friday night. Have I mentioned that Brandy and I are learning line dancing? Well we are. A local club gives lessons every week, so away we go. And they have $0.50 draft beers, so...
Anyway, we've been going for a few weeks now, enough for me to know about a half dozen dances or so, so I was able to actually go out and dance! It was very enjoyable, I can' t wait to learn more dances so I can go dance to more songs.

Also, on Monday I beat the game BioShock, so I'm pretty pleased about that. That game deserves its own post, but needless to say that if you enjoy first-person shooters (and even if you don't - I don't!) this game is very good, and very, very creepy.

The Low: So, technically, this happenned Monday, but it was kinda on the weekend as well, so I'm including it. Lakers Center Andrew Bynum is out with an injured knee for 2-3 months. He got hurt over the weekend. You may remember that something similar happened last year, and Bynum didn't return until the beginning of this season. You may also rememeber that a large resaon we lost in the NBA Finals was because he was hurt. So he heals slowly, may not be back until April/May, and we can't win in the Finals without him. Yeah, we're screwed. I'm a little frustrated because, once again, the injury bug may keep us from winning a title. I'm beginning to switch to "Not Boston" mode again. *Sigh*

Tales of Berkeley

2009-01-29T08:42:00.001-08:00

I can't believe I lived in a city with a "Peace and Justice Commission." And here's the latest from the People's Republic of Berkeley:

Berkeley's public library will face a showdown with the city's Peace and Justice Commission tonight over whether a service contract for the book check-out system violates the city's nuclear-free ordinance.

The dispute centers on a five-year, $63,000 contract the library wants to sign with 3M, an international technology company based in Minnesota, to service five scanner machines library patrons use to check out books.

But 3M, a company with operations in 60 countries, refused to sign Berkeley's nuclear-free disclosure form as required by the Nuclear Free Berkeley Act passed by voters in 1986.

As a result, the library's self-checkout machines have not been serviced in about six months. Library officials say 3M is the only company authorized by the manufacturer to fix the machines, which were purchased in 2004.

The library asked the Peace and Justice Commission for a waiver, but at its Jan. 5 meeting the commission voted 7-1, with two abstentions, to reject the request. The library is now appealing the decision to the City Council...

The Peace and Justice Commission does not see it that way. Commissioners said the library should try harder to find a company that complies with the Nuclear Free Berkeley Act.

"We really mean it when we say we don't want to be part of the nuclear machinery," said commission member George Lippman. "The act is meant to be a blow against nuclear war. We're serious about upholding that."

*sigh*. What do you say when you really can't parody a city anymore?

Weekend Highs & Lows

2009-01-26T06:22:00.000-08:00

Well, following the spirit of a local rock radio station I thought I would tell everyone what my weekend highs and lows were each Monday. Theoretically, this will keep me posting at least once a week. We'll see. Anyway, for this past weekend:

The High: Double Experience Weekend on City of Heroes!! City of Heroes is a MMORPG (Massively Multi-Player Online Role Playing Game, for the uninitiated). Think of it like World of Warcraft meets comic books. You create a hero, with special powers and the like, and then go stop bad guys. The more bad guys you stop, the more powerful your hero becomes. In any case, you gained double the experience points this weekend while playing, which means lots-o-fun!!!

And while that High may sound kinda lame (and it is, even by my standards), it's because of...

The Low: I was sick all weekend. Yeah. There's nothing better than spending half your weekend feeling like you don't even have any energy to enjoy Double Experince Weekend. Ick. I blame Brandy.

Other highlights include: Re-vamping my Facebook (I have a whole list of reasons why Facebook is better than MySpace, but that's a post for another day); Line Dancing with Brandy Friday night (yeah, we're learning to Line Dance, there's another post I need to write about!); and watching the Lakers kick all kinds of Spur ass.

Engaged!

2009-01-16T13:59:00.001-08:00

You may have heard that Brandy and I got engaged (Brandy and I both changed our MySpace status to relfect this) earlier this week. I couldn't be happier about it - I am truly blessed to have someone as wonderful as her in my life. I could tell you all about how it happened, but Brandy did a superb job of it herself here with pictures here. Go ahead and go read it and then come back for my thoughts. I'll wait.

*sigh* Fine; too lazy to go click the link? I'll copy and paste it:

My uncle called me a few weeks ago to invite me down for the day so John requested it off work. Little did I know my uncle was in on the whole thing. Anyways, we have breakfast with my uncle and hang out for most of the day. As we were leaving John didn't drive to the freeway, instead he went to PCH. We ended up at a restaraunt called Captain Jacks (which is right on a canal) and he explained that he had some extra money and wanted to treat me to a nice dinner. As we were sitting there at the end of dinner, John told me that he had something else planned right after. Next thing I know we're walking out the back door to the canal where a gondola is pulling up. We get in and start our journey around the canals looking at all the beautiful houses and the stars. Under the 2nd bridge we start kissing and he pulls away and tells me he wants to break tradition for a moment and he tells me how much he loves me and then gets down on one knee and pulls out the ring and asks me to marry him. It was so romantic! Once the gondola ride is over, we leave the restaraunt and start heading down PCH. We get no more than a few blocks away and he pulls into this nice bed and breakfast. We walk up to the door (they hid the key under the mat for us so we didn't have to check in once we got there) and we walk into the room. There were candles everywhere and rose petals on the bed and some wine and fruit on the table. It was absolutely beautiful! We stayed the night there and finally made it home this morning to spread the good news.I hope you all are as excited for us as I am!

So, some thoughts from my point of view:

First, it was really hard to not show Brandy how excited I was about this. I mean, when you get engaged it's a life-altering moment, and I knew it was coming, but couldn't show how excited I was! It's like being a kid (or me) on Christmas Eve, but not being allowed to be bouncing off the walls. Especially the day of, I was counting down the mintues until the moment arrived.
Of course, Brandy attempted to thwart my plans (unknowingly). She mentioned our overnight stay in Huntington Beach and of course I packed a bag for the night for us. I did this without her knowing, so of course I had to pick shirts and hope that she didn't want to wear them the day before we went (and that they matched whatever shoes she wore that day, etc.). So of course I pick the one shirt she wants to wear the day before we go! FAIL!
One picture Brandy hasn't posted, but should, is her steak from our dinner together. Sucker was 30 ounces! Go ahead and look at what FOUR POUNDS of steak looks like. It was huge.
I had assumed, once we got on the gondola, that Brandy would be expecting the proposal. So I was (pleasantly!) surprised when I got down on one knee and heard a shocked gasp from her!
It's been pretty windy in southern california the last few days, and I was particularly worried about the wind and temperature for an evening gondola ride, but it was quite calm winded and warm with clear skies. All in all, a perfect evening.

Anyway, it's nearly two days later and Brandy and I are still both pretty giddy about the whole thing. I am so completely in love with her and could not be happier about the way everything worked out. I am super excited to start preparing for a wedding, and of course being able to spend the rest of my life with someone as wondeful and amazing as Brandy!

Killing time

2009-01-07T13:55:00.001-08:00

So fairly often I find myself at work just trying to kill some time, but not wanting to get too involved with anything. For example, perhaps I just got back from the field and need to hang around the office for 20 minutes to have worked 8 hours; or for another example on Wednesdays we have a meeting at 1:30pm, a half hour after lunch, which is more time than it takes to check how the Lakers are doing, but not enough time to really get involved with anything work-related. So what do I do?

Wikipedia. Specifically, I look at lots of random articles. Why? Well, it takes ZERO brain power to click the button, and every once in a while you learn something new and exciting. Sadly, more often than not, you get the wiki pages for podunk towns or "communes" in France, but every now and then you get to read about something interesting that you would never have thought to look up.

Alternatively, I do what I'm doing now: update my blog via email. And Reva, if that link to Wikipedia works, then that's how you insert links into these types of blog posts. I know you're curious.

Testing...

2008-12-31T08:03:00.001-08:00

Like The Reva, I am testing to see if this "email blogging" system works. Have a Happy New Year in the meantime folks!!

Merry Chirstmas!

2008-12-24T13:31:00.001-08:00

I hope everyone has a wonderful, safe, blessed Chirstmas!

Winter's Arrival!

2008-12-22T11:02:00.000-08:00

I called in my first "Snow Day" from work last week, and was reminded just how much I dislike snow.

Last week a friend of Brandy's needed to run to Las Vegas real quick to deal with some issues. (A quick note, Las Vegas may seem far to everyone, but remember that it's only about a 3-4 hour drive from our apartment, so it's not like it's that far. It's about an hour more than going to San Diego.) Looking at the weather I decided to go with just in case there were some problems getting back home (I didn't want Brandy driving through the snow by herself.). So Tuesday evening we trucked up there without any problems.

Wednesday morning came and we started taking care of business. It was cold outside, but I wasn't too worried about it. Until about mid-afternoon, as we were getting ready to leave - when it started snowing. By 4pm they had closed the I-15 at Primm and (of course) Victorville. So we were snowed in. In Vegas. Now sure, there are worse places to be snowed in at. But being in Vegas, with no money, no change of clothes, and having to call off work, well, that sucks.

The passes didn't open again until Thursday afternoon - and the mountains were still icy!! I thought Brandy was going to have a heart attack a few times! We didn't get home until late Thursday night so were able to work on Friday, but, damn, that was unpleasant.

Moral of the story: Winter sucks. But I'm sure The Reva will be telling us all about that pretty soon.

Book Review

2008-11-23T15:08:00.000-08:00

THE BRO CODE.

(Men, highlight below to read the review. Women, well, please ignore the following as just a random rambling of a drunk geologist. Sorry ladies, I'm just keeping Article 4 fulfilled.)

Awesomeness abounds.

After being reccommended by The Reva I couldn't not read the new book out by Barney Stinson (and Matt Kuhn) based off of Barney's rules for life from How I Met Your Mother. (Note, by "couldn't not read," I clearly mean "Brandy awesomely bought so I decided to read it because it looked AWESOME.) It's definitely hilarious, and fits in with the personality of the show and Barney. Is it offensive? Yes. Is it demeaning? Duh. But it's also friggin' great. Just spend the 10 bucks and 2 hours to read it. You won't regret it.

And remember Article 43: A bro loves his country, unless that country isn't America.

Also, if you aren't watching HIMYM, do so. Like, post haste. In fact, come over to my place and I can put in the DVD of the first two seasons to catch you up.

Quantum of Solace Review

2008-11-23T06:09:00.000-08:00

So I saw the new James Bond movie Quantum of Solace last weekend when it opened with Brandy. I know that my reader(s) fall into two categories: those with short attention spans, and those with longer ones. So let me split my review into two - a short one and a long one!

First, the short answer: It was a good movie - but not as good as Casino Royale. Go see it anyway.

So, now for the long one...

First, let me disclaim that I like Bond movies. A lot. Even when they aren't particularly good, there's something about them that I really like. And Quantum is no exception. And perhaps that is the problem - it felt like all the other Bond movies. Casino Royale was different from other Bond movies. Way different. It was darker, grittier. It relied less on cool gadgets and more on a cool Bond. And I think this difference made the movie stand out so much. In contrast, Quantum felt like every other Bond movie (to a large extent). I could see Pierce Brosnan as Bond in Quantum, where I couldn't in Casino Royale. So if you go in expecting Casino you're probably going to leave with Goldeneye. And that's not entirely a bad thing.

So specifically (and spoiler-free... mostly) what did I like? Well, first enough cannot be said about the awesomeness of Daniel Craig and Judi Dench. I've thought that Dench was the best M since she showed up, and Craig is quickly rising on my favorite Bond list. Most people feel Sean Connery is the ultimate Bond - and I am not going to argue that - but Craig may be usurping the second slot previously held by Pierce Brosnan (although I'll be watching Goldeneye again this weekend, so we'll see how that holds up). The other major plus I give the movie is the attempt to give Bond an actual recurring villain in the evil group Quantum. I've been hoping for this for years, ever since Bond brought down SPECTRE long ago. I think it gives James a much better motive, and builds some continuity and development to the series.

Now the negatives. My biggest problem can really be summed up by pointing to the change in Director between Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. I think this change ended up altering the atmosphere of the movie, which I think lessened the drama. Additionally, the director Mike Forster tried to get too cute with the cinematography. Every Bond has a few chase scenes, but I felt that Quantum had one chase scene, followed by a short conversation, followed by another chase scene. Instead of adding tension, it bored me. These types of directing choices I think hurt the movie.

One other thing this impresses upon me is the writing ability of Ian Fleming, the creator of Bond. The early Bond movies were based upon his novels, but the later ones - including all of the Brosnan movies - were not. Casino Royale was. Quantum of Solace was not. Noticing a pattern? I think I will start searching out these books to try and figure out why Fleming's novels have adapted so well to the big screen.

Apparent Dip

2008-10-16T11:37:00.000-07:00

I just added a new link to my "Awesome Links" sidebar to a blog i just found (thanks to Blogger! Surpirse there!) called Apparent Dip. It's written by a post-doc researching at a college near the Bay Area, and it's got some interesting stuff about geology (yes, the title is a geologic term).

By the way, the new line beneath my blog title is the motto for the Great California ShakeOut, which, Apparent Dip tells me, is a series of events set up by southern California to educate and prepare people for "the Big One." I'm gonna go make myself an earthquake kit now. Maybe I'll post its contents and such here later.

Knott's Scary Farm

2008-10-16T10:44:00.001-07:00

Well I finally went. For 21 of my 25 years on Earth, I've lived in relatively close proximity to "Knott's Scary Farm," Knott's Berry Farm's annual Halloween festival, I finally went last weekend. The verdict: I would've had more fun 10 years ago.

First, the set up: Brandy and I got a good deal on a package including tickets to the Park, dinner, breakfast, a night in the hotel, parking and t-shirts for around $230. Pretty sweet, we figured, which is how we afforded to go. I'm glad I went, it was definitely worth at least going to once. You know, kinda like going to Alcatraz while at Berkeley, you need to at least once. We went on about 5 or 6 of their Huanted House/Maze things, a ride or two (ok, just one - Ghost Rider), and saw one of their shows (Fangs - the vampire one). Overall, it wasn't bad per se, just not great, either.

First, the really good parts: The costuming and atmosphere were top notch. Everyone from the guys roaming the park to in the mazes and shows had extremely well-made costumes. And not just in a scary way. Some were very well camaglouged to scare you, which worked well, and some were just damn pretty looking. The vampire chicks from Fangs wore especially nice costumes. Also, at certain points in the park they had fog machines creating a spooky atmostphere, which worked very well. The mazes themselves were well-made and very detailed, had a good amount of variety (there was a rural/farm maze, an alien maze, a forest-Labrynth maze, Las Vegas maze, clowns of course, and a few others) and some were quite disturbing.

A note about the Fangs musical. Having seen Bite in Las Vegas - which is also about vampires, I was a little biased going in. I mean, it's tough to beat a topless Vegas show about vampires set to classic rock. And of course Fangs wasn't as good. But it was good. It was mostly hampered by its own indeciciveness. It was half-funny, half-scary, and it did both quite well, but the juxtaposition of the two kept me from fully getting into it. If they had picked to be either satirical or scary I think it would have been better. Well, and it could've been topless, but that may be asking for a bit much from Knott's.

To use a Dungeons & Dragons reference, the whole experience was just an exercise in making Spot Checks (or Perception checks, to be technical). In other words, if you noticed the guy standing behind the tree over there, or heard the chainsaw killer behind you, you weren't as scared when they burst out in front of you. As such, I was constanly on the lookout for the next "monster," as it were, always looking around corners cautiously and peering behind me. (I should note that some of the costumes in the mazes were so good - and the cast so well trained - that I still didn't see all of them before the popped out at me; I was pretty impressed by this, of course.) So it became a fairly tiring task for me to constantly be "on edge," anticipating the next move. In this way I didn't like it; I didn't feel relaxed enough to enjoy it. I think I would have liked it more when I was younger. This isn't really a knock against the park itself, just an observation about my own personality.

One thing I really didn't like however were the crowds. It was packed. Ridiculously so. And mostly with screaming, yelling, obnoxious whiny teenage girls. Awesome. I mentioned above that we went on one ride and that was because the lines for the rides were GINORMOUSLY HUGE. There were several rides we were contemplating going on, but the lines sometimes bordered on 3 hours long and, well, screw that. Sadly, the one ride we did go on was Ghost Rider, which was far scarier than anything else in the park. It's a wooden roller coaster, but it's design is so poor that it constantly vibrates and rattles. Every time we went around a turn I swear I thought the thing was going to fly off the tracks. Not fun.

When Brandy and I rode Ghost Rider we were behind a group of kids - late high school, i figured - that pumped their fists and make train noises the whole time, screaming and acting like idiots generally. They seemed to be really enjoying themselves. And then I realized: These are the drunk frat boys of the future.

Brandy has pics from the night on her MySpace (I'll try to put a link up later).

Fall Comes Fast

2008-10-14T08:37:00.000-07:00

The fall months hit quickly this year. Last Wednesday it was 90+ degrees, and on Friday it was 70 degrees (yes, 70 is considered Fall weather where I live). It was strange. But Fall is my favorite times of the year. It's cooled off enough so it's not oppressively hot, but it's not ridiculously cold yet (yes, 60 degrees is "ridiculously cold" where I live. Deal with it.). Plus, the cool, crisp mornings make it feel like the holidays, which is always fun.

In more sad news, my cable had "technical problems" last night, and I missed all the good shows (How I Met Your Mother, Big Bang Theory, Two & a Half Men). Typical, really. There's exactly one night a week I like to watch television, and naturally my cable is knocked out that night. *sigh*

Also, Brandy and I got the kitten fixed yesterday, so she has to wear a cone around her head so she doesn't lick at the stitches. It makes her really funny looking. I'll try to take some pictures, but Brandy may not let me.

I want a Following

2008-10-01T15:05:00.000-07:00

Please Follow Me.

Really. I'll post more if I think more people are reading my blog.

EPIC FAIL!!

2008-10-01T14:08:00.001-07:00

Yeah, yeah, I know, I promised more frequent posting. *sigh*

Really, I'm waiting for Brandy to update a little first. And in my defense, I have a post regarding the newest Star Wars movie that was 3/4 written before I went on vacation (a month ago) that I never finished. Now it just seems dated to post it. But I will... eventually.

In other news, Brandy uploaded some pictures from Cancun to her MySpace. I'm still tirelessly working, banging my head against a wall regarding the election, spitting in disgust anytime the words "Boston" and "sports team" are mentioned, and eagerly anticipating the NBA season.

In an ideal world, I'll have more on these things soon. I won't promise, because we all know how that would turn out.

Minor Update

2008-08-18T07:06:00.001-07:00

I added a new link over on the sidebar: Forum Blue & Gold. It's my favorite Lakers-related site, although it's far from the only good NBA site. Don't worry, though. I have more stuff coming this week - before Brandy and I head off for vacation in Cancun, including a movie review, life details, and a probably unhealthy discussion of stick figures.

Things That Irritate Me - Part II

2008-07-28T14:42:00.001-07:00

I didn't plan to put up another one of these so quickly, but it's Monday and I'm at work and not in the best moods to begin with, and now I'm irritated.

For those of you (fortunate enough) to not have worked in an office environment much yet, count your blessings, because believe me, it's annoying. And not in a "Dilbert-esque" amusing annoying. I mean, it may start that way, but it quickly devolves into just damn annoying.

For me, one of the biggest problems with working in an office atmosphere is that I'm around people. I'll grant that my job has caused me to become short-tempered with dealing with co-workers; after all, I spend most of my time out with a drill rig not talking to anyone all day. I'm used to the (relative) solitude of field work, so being around people in general can quickly try my patience. But often, people don't help themselves at all.

Everyone knows the stereotypical Important Person in the community. You may not know their job, but you see them getting coffee or standing in line at the grocery store. A cell phone attached to their ear, they gab loudly to the other person, perhaps misunderstanding the technology and thinking that if the person is far away, they need to talk louder. And so they do. Louder and LOUDER AND LOUDER. As frustrating as this can be, it's worse in a confined space of an office.

There is always one guy in an office that takes every call on speaker phone, so that he can click away on his computer while on the phone and be extra productive. And it's never the quiet guy who does this either. Oh no, it's the loudest person in the office who decides: "Hey, I know. I'll broadcast every call - no matter how trivial, or about what - to the entire office, so they can all hear just how hard I'm working." And because it's a speakerphone your co-worker has to speak extra loud just to make himself clear to the person on the other line. Of course, the speakerphone is also up as loud as possible, so you hear both ends of the conversation quite well.

This can be more than a little distracting. How do I deal with this? Well, for starters, I try to ignore it by focusing on something peaceful - like updating my blog. =)

Things that Irritate Me - Part I

2008-07-26T07:42:00.000-07:00

Well it seems that weekly updates may be more up my alley. Still, that's better than monthly, right? So here I'm starting a new feature that I call "People and Things that Piss me Off Because They're Stupid." Great title, I know - it's a work in progress. Mainly I'll be highlighting things that happen to me and make me realize just how annoying certain things can be. Today's topic: Driver's who change lanes ridiculously slowly!

You all know the type. If you're lucky they put their blinker on, but more often than not, they just kinda lazily drift from their lane to yours - they're in no rush, it may take them a quarter-mile to get over, but off they go, straddling two lanes. Most likely, these awesome drivers (note: sarcasm) usually can't focus on driving straight and changing lanes at the same time, so they almost always start slowing down - so much so that by the time they're in front of you, they're going 15mph slower than when they started. And God help you if you're going uphill or turning while they're changing lanes.

It can get worse though. Sometimes these slow lane changers turn while you are behind them. They signal you that they are turning long before they actually put on a blinker. They begin by slowing down to about 15mph - three times as fast as the speed they actually take the turn, mind you - about 2 blocks before their turn and then as it approaches begin to move over. They don't swiftly get out of your way so you can resume driving at an appropriate speed though. As always, they drift ever so slowly that you are reminded of glacial movements. All the while, traffic builds up behind you. Irritating as hell.

I wish I could say that these people are all from one category of driver (like, old), but, sadly, they aren't. Certainly elderly drivers often do exhibit these issues, but so do lots of others. But one thing is for certain: if you're in a hurry, at least one of them will be in front of you. Guarantted.

Obligatory Posting

2008-07-17T16:25:00.000-07:00

So much to blog, so little time...

It's been Crazy (yeah, with a capital "c") busy at work and home this week, hence the no blogging. I wish I could blog while driving because I think of coolio things to blog about while driving to and from my job sites, but, alas, my energy is too spent when I return home to do so. Nonetheless, I wanted to take this opportunity to promote

DR. HORRIBLE'S SING ALONG BLOG

It's a musical written and directed by Joss Whedon starring Neil Patrick Harris. It's... interesting. Worth a look. It's free online until Sunday, July 20th, so get clicking!

(thanks Reva)

Polling Results

2008-07-11T06:42:00.001-07:00

Well, I would complain about the lack of votes, but to be honest, there were more than I expected. On the down side, we were left with an even number of votes - two for nerdy stuff, two for Life/General Stuff. Hopefully, those that like nerdiness were appeased here, but they can expect more. As for general stuff, I'll see what I can do. My life is pretty boring as is. Not that I'm complaining.

On a side note - about my sidebar! - I really like the new feature of linking blogs that show you when they last updated. I think it kinda motivates me to keep updating.

Fixing Star Wars

2008-07-08T14:13:00.000-07:00

I've spoken before of my frustration with the Star Wars saga. In many ways, George Lucas reminds me of long-time X-Men scribe Chis Cleremont (wiki). Recently, Claremont has had some good ideas that his clumsy plotting and horrible dialogue made nearly unreadable. I often found myself reading issues of Uncanny X-Men just hoping that it would be better because, hey, I liked the premise!

Similarly, Lucas's idea for Star Wars is amazing! From the epic feel, to the detached Jedi and everything in between, the general ideas and concepts are top notch, which is one reason the franchise has lasted as long as it has. But, as most evident is the recent trilogy, Lucas writes dialogue very poorly, and his directing is pretty sub par. So how would I fix it? Well, let's turn on the Way Back machine and take a crack at it:

First of all, the first thing that should have happened is George Lucas should have found himself a writer or co-writer and/or director that had balls. Like, big huge cajones. Big enough to say "Screw you Lucas, that sucks!" Think about it; go back and watch Phantom Menace and imagine if someone like Spielberg, Tarentino, or hell, even Michael Bay had been on the set. You think any of them wouldn't have said "uh, George, maybe a 9-year-old protagonist isn't such a great idea..." Why are Empire Strikes Back nad Return of the Jedi considered the best movies of the saga? Could it have something to do with the fact that Lucas didn't direct or write the screenplays for them? I'm currently reading the novel of Episode II, and even though it's based on the screenplay, it's much better because the author (R.A. Salvatore) has put a greater emphasis on nurturing Anakin and Padme's relationship; you understand what it is in him that she finds so attractive - unlike the movie, where the entire thing feels forced.

Second, there needs to be better lightsaber fights. Episode I had - hands down - the best lightsaber duel this side of Ryan vs. Dorkman. But after that everything went downhill. Attack fo the Clones didn't have much (although I admit seeing Yoda kick ass was cool), and while Revenge of the Sith had fights a-plenty, they all suffered from the same problem, namely, too much facial close-ups, not enough wide-angle shots. All in all, very disapointing, made all the more so by the great beginning in Phantom Menace.

Third, make Anakin older! If everything else had been the same, Episode I would have been much better if Anakin had been, say, 19, instead of 9. In fact, make both Anakin and Padme their ages from Episode II and there are no problems. You can easily begin his fixiation with her - and wanting to protect her - and no one's asking "What the hell is a 14-year-old doing as a freaking Queen?" It has the added bonus of making it less of a continuity problem with Luke becoming a Jedi. As it is, it seems strange that a 9-year old was nearly not allowed to be trained by Yoda, only to have him go ahead and train Luke when he was late teens/early twenties.

A corollary to that, show me Anakin interacting with other Jedi. In Clones we're told (over and over) that he's arrogant, but we never really see him being all that arrogant. He's mostly being whiny constantly. You really are never given a frame of reference regarding what Jedi Padawans are supposed to be like - except for Obi Wan in Episode I. Contrasting Anakin with others of his age would have shown how he was acting different, and what that difference could lead to.

Finally, stop making it harder on yourselves. Lucas had to have known that these movies would be ruthlessly picked apart by fans, yet he opened up so many problem areas when there was no reason to! The relative ages of Anakin and Luke is one example; the (needless) introduction of midichlorians is another, and the self-contradicting "prophecy" sub-plot is a third. And that isn't even bringing up the stupidity that is Jar Jar Binks.

So there you go. That's how I would have made Star Wars better. I haven't looked online for any websites or anything to see if other people have thought of these things or others, but I'm sure they have. These are just the thoughts I have as I read through the Star Wars books.

While We're Waiting

2008-07-08T06:43:00.000-07:00

Since we still have a few days before the poll closes (vote now if you haven't yet!), I'll share this little gem with everyone: Chess Boxing.

The match began over a chess board set up on a low table in the middle of a
boxing ring.
Stripped to the waist, wearing towels around their shoulders
and headphones playing the lulling sound of a moving train to drown out the
baying crowd, the men played for four minutes. Then off came their reading
glasses and on went the gloves and the mouthguards.
For three minutes they
beat each other and then, when the bell went, the chess board was back in the
ring and they picked up the gentlemanly game where they had left off.

Awesome is all I'll say. Not that I would ever want to do that, but it's just wierd enough that I might watch it late at night on ESPN2 or what have you.

Awesome Links Part 1 - The Campaign Spot

2008-07-04T08:05:00.000-07:00

POLITICS ALERT!!

While the voting is still going on, I did promise to wirte about all the websites that I'm linking to, and I thought that I would start doing that. I think everyone should read at least one political blog, especially during the presidential election season, and I've found few that are as interesting and well written as Jim Gergahty at National Review's The Campaign Spot. While, yes, his personal politics are pretty right-of-center, he tries to give a fair shake to the opposition. He's even been used by the Obama campaign to dispel bad rumors! I find the writing sharp and unique; he has done an exceptional job of live-blogging all of the primary debates (and there were like 40 of them this season!).

And he uses references to Star Wars characters and occasionally Transformers. How do you beat that?

So if you are looking for a good round up of political content that is pretty damn fair but has a right-of-center point-of-view, check out The Campaign Spot.

More Blogging Changes

2008-07-01T15:09:00.001-07:00

I've put up a poll that you can see on the right-hand side of my blog asking what you want to hear most about. Now, keep in mind that I'll probably ramble at least a little about all of these topics, but if people are more interested in something then I will try to focus on that. Hopefully this gets more responses than my last poll-like post.

The Update Nobody Notices (UPDATED!)

2008-06-30T16:00:00.001-07:00

So I spent a bit of time this weekend updating my blog in a way that would be hard to notice immediately:

I've added Labels to all of my posts (all 104, to be precise!). You can now (theoretically) search them for a specific genre! Expect all my new posts to have Labels as well.

It has also allowed me to see what I talk about most; mostly just random crap of my life. No real surprise there. So should I mix it up some? I have uber-nerdy thoughts in my head that I may share with you all, but could you handle the nerdy-ness??

UPDATE: It should be fairly obvious to everyone that I've changed my layout as well. The links to personal blogs are over on the side as well as links to nifty web sites - my plan is to talk about each and every one of them, and I am more than happy to put more on that people send me. I have also added a nifty list of all my categories that I post in, just in case anyone wants to read all my posts about American Gladiators or something (I'll get to them more; I promise).

Questions or suggestions? Leave 'em in the comments!

Wierdest Hangover Sympton Ever

2008-06-29T09:34:00.000-07:00

When you have a hangover, there are certain symptoms that you are used to and that you just accept as part of getting too drunk: hedaches, stomach problems, lethargy, etc. When I get a touch too drunk (which doesn't happen often, I assure you) I'm fine with these things because, hey, I deserve it.

However, yesterday, I had a new sympton: leg cramps.

Seriously.

Now, I'm not sure how over-working my liver leads to my quadraceps feeling like I did 3 bazillion squats, but there it was. Irritating as hell, and uncomfortable. It's like my body decided "Well, the headaches aren't working, so let's come up with a new way to punish him for abusing us." And lo, my legs hurt all day.

I think I'll stick with the headaches

Happy Birthday Reva!!

2008-06-23T16:36:00.001-07:00

This is kinda like a card, but a day late, but hey, at least I'm updating right?

Anyway, wonderful birthday wishes to The Reva and my wonderful darling Brandy.

Kitten Pictures

2008-06-22T11:57:00.000-07:00

OK, so there are pictures of Roxie - our new kitten - posted.

No, they're not on my blog; why waste the time to post them here when Brandy has already posted them on her MySpace page?

So go look and say "Awww..."

And no Reva, I don't want any more cute pictures of puppies. They'll just make me cry.

The Post That Never Was

2008-06-19T14:00:00.000-07:00

Actually, this could be a whole series of posts.

I meant to talk about the Lakers roller-coaster season long before I actually did; I was going to chime in my two cents on the presidential primaries back in January, I've got oodles of games to mini-review; and of course plenty of OOTS and PVP to talk about.

But this post is about something else entirely.

I take you back to October; as some may remember, it wasn't an awesome time for me. My grandmother had just passed away, my house had been sans renters for months (I know, the more things change, the more they stay the same...), and life was pretty bleh. Brandy wasn't in tons better shape, with a close family friend passing away around the same time and work was driving her nearly insane (again, see above). All in all, not a fabulous time for either of us.

So Brandy decided that we needed an awesome weekend to, you know, make up for things and keep ourselves from bieng in a rut of sorts. She had intended to surprise me, but wasn't too subtle about finding out what time I would be off work, so I knew something was going on.

(In her defense, I sometimes had been getting off work early, depending on how the rest of the week was working out for me, but didn't that day. I should also note that I was only slightly better at surprising her last Christmas, but I digress)

I came home from work on a Friday afternoon - shortly after Brandy and I had been together for six months - to find an envelope taped to my bathroom mirror. It was a note from Brandy telling me to pack a small bag, wear something slightly nice, and meet me at her place. I was surprised by the direction, and couldn't help but smile, glad that Brandy had thought ahead enough to place the note in a location that I would see it.

So, showered and cleaned, I drove over to her place. Arriving at her door, I knocked. No response. I knocked again. No response. So I used my key to her apartment and let myself in.

"But wait!" I hear readers yell. "If you had a key, why did you knock?" Well, I figured that if Brandy had planned something for me I didn't want to surprise her by just bargin in. Knocking gave her a chance to prepare herself.

So in I went, entering into the unknown, bag in hand, and I see a pair of big eyes staring back at me as I walk in the door. "Well hello," I said. Eager to see me, I received a quick reply of:

"Meow."

Brandy was nowhere to be found, and I was left alone in her apartment with her cat! Doing my best Gil Grisom impersonation I began looking for clues. I began by, in fact, making sure she wasn't there. Confirming that, I made a bee-line to her bathroom, hoping to find something there, as there had been at my house. And lo, my detective skills paid off! I found another envelope, with instructions to meet Brandy at a specified address, along with directions. With another lonely meow from the cat to send me off, I was on my way, eagerly awaiting what would come next.

I soon (ok, not exactly "soon," since I had to take the 91 freeway, during rush hour, which always causes problems, but for the sake of the story we'll say soon) I found myself at the address - the Mariott Hotel in Riverside! Finding Brandy, she explained how she felt we needed a "weekend away," (I agreed) and though this wasn't exactly far away, it was indeed away. Expecting an enjoyable weekend, off we went to the elevator.

As we entered the elevator I noticed a small sign which read "Enter room key to access 10th floor." "I wonder what's on the 10th floor..." I mused aloud. "You'll see..." Brandy responded, quite to my surprise, as she put a room key into the slot. I was quite excited by the time we entered and saw a "romantic suite," complete with candles (electric), rose petals, a huge bed and our own hot tub!! On the counter were some chocolate-covered strawberries and champagne, and Brandy's laptop playing romantic music.

Needless to say, we had quite the relaxing and enjoyable weekend. Of course, this is all long hand for me to say: Brandy is wonderful to me, and I am lucky, grateful and oh-so-happy to have her. Everyone should be so blessed.

Why These Finals Matter to Me

2008-06-17T14:16:00.000-07:00

Well, for starters, obviously, I'm a huge Lakers fan.

But there's more than that.

At the beginning of last October I made a long trip out to West Virginia because my grandmother passed away. It was a difficult time for me because we had always been very close. She taught me to be a Lakers fan. All of my habits (good and bad!), my passion, my genuine love of the game came from her. I don't know how she became a Lakers fan. I never asked, though now I wish I had. But when I was young and she lived with us, I would stay up late and go into her room and watch basketball with her. It was awesome.

So I went to her funeral, consoled my family and came home and went on with life. A few weeks later the NBA season officailly started; and before long a plucky young Lakers team that a few months before had been full of bickering, trade demands and hostility began growing into a championship-caliber team. I've watched them throughout the season as they took their lumps, won games they shouldn't have and lost plenty I wish they hadn't, and every time I couldn't help but think how much my grandmother would have loved these Lakers. They're the closest - I think - to Showtime that we've gotten, and they are just a ton of fun to watch.

So I watched, and remembered, and cheered.

And now here we are, facing impossible odds, and all I can think is that I wish that she could have been here with me. I would have paid damn good money to have flown to West Viriginia and watched one more NBA Finals with her. But I can't.

So instead I'll watch it at home, knowing damn well that she's watching too - and having ol' Chick Hearn calling play-by-play the whole time no doubt - and remember her.

So the emotion will be high tonight; on the court and off. I'm sure lots of Lakers fans will feel the same way; the fear of having the season end so close to a championship. I'll be there, screaming at every call, every play, hoping for a miracle and knowing that my grandmother is doing the same.

For me, these Finals are about memories, and here's hoping for another happy one.

Celtics = Obama

2008-06-08T18:55:00.001-07:00

I'm watching Game 2 of the NBA Finals right now, and I can't help but notice the similarities between this competition and the presidential election. See, watching (and more importantly, listnening to the damn TV announcers) the game it becomes obvious that there is really no need to play these games; the outcome has been decided. The Celtics were anoited NBA champions last summer with the Garnett trade; everything else is just a formality.

Evidence? Leon Powe has shot 10 free throws; the entire Lakers team? 2. Three Lakers are in foul trouble. Celtics? None. Paul Pierce fakes an injury and is hailed as a hero.

The reason is obvious; the Lakers are like the Yankees - the team everyone loves to hate. Because the Celtics have sucked since the '60s - with a few years excepted when Bird made them good - and the Lakers haven't, LA has become the "bad guy" and the Celtics the "good guy."

Similarly, Obama has been anoited by the media, first against Hillary in the primary, and now certainly in the General. Everything will be ignored that could hurt Obama; everything - real and imagined - will be thrown at McCain. In both cases, its extremely frustrating.

The only way this could be worse is if The Sports Guy was broadcasting.

Airport Fashion

2008-06-03T06:36:00.000-07:00

I'm glad I was careful in selecting what shirt to wear when I flew to Raleigh last week or I might have ended up like this guy:

An airline passenger claimed that a security guard threatened to arrest him
because he was wearing a T-shirt showing a cartoon robot with a gun.
Brad
Jayakody, 30, from London, said he was stopped from passing through security at
Heathrow's Terminal 5 after his Transformers T-shirt was deemed
'offensive.'

Awesome. If you read the whole article, you find out that it was offended because Optimus Prime was holding... a gun!

Yes, now it's not just acutal weapons that are prohibited, but images of weapons that are. I wonder if I show up with a T-shirt of some toothpaste that's not in a quart-sized ziploc bag if I'll be let on the plane.

My only consolation here is that this was in London.

An Upside to Kittens

2008-06-03T06:21:00.001-07:00

I suppose an upside to this kitten situation is that I am up at the ass-crack of dawn most mornings (at least, I have been since Sunday). Thus it gives me time to think about posting.

Not that I've had a lack of things to discuss; oh no, there's plenty to talk about from the LA Lakers finally making it back to the NBA Finals, to the presidential campaign, WiiViews, and what I've been up to, I've never really been lacking things to discuss. Rather, I've never had either the a)time, or b)motivation to post.

But I have plans. Grand ones, at that. Well, at least a little. But before I take on anything ambitious I have to prove to myself that I can keep at least a little blog updated regularly, so I'm trying once again. Honestly, the more often I have found myself not posting, the more impressed I am by people like The Reva who post so damn frequently! It's not easy!

So what's this post about? Nothing, really. Just sorta rambling. But ok, I'll talk about something. Let's talk about the 2nd best thing to happen to TV recently (the first, of course, being How I Met Your Mother): American Gladiators.

Damn Straight.

This show is awesome for so many reasons. First of all, check out their Wiki page, it's just full of good info. But I love nearly everything about this show, from the (awful! - and I mean awful) clished dialogue to Titan's mullet, to Wolf's teeth and taunt, to Helg's deep voice, to Jet and tiny little Rocket winning. It's just freaking cool. Like, retro cool, but not in a it's-only-cool-'cause-we-feel-nostalgia way. In a wow-it's-retro-and-I-like it! way. I find myself rooting for the Gladiators pretty regularly, only picking a contestant during the Eliminator when there are no Gladiators.

If you enjoyed the original AG, you will also enjoy this one. It's really just a fun show, a neat competition with really cool events and Gladiators that they try - sometimes too hard - to give some personality too.

Oh wait. One thing I forgot: Layla Ali sucks. There; I had to say it.

Everything else rocks!

A Day Late and a Short Post

2008-06-02T19:32:00.000-07:00

I promised some people that I would post on June 1st.

Sorry I'm late.

And sad to say that this will be a (very) short post.

But both are for good reasons: Namely, we picked up a stray cat. A kitten, actually. I know, I know. I'm not a cat person, per se. But this (way too damn adorable for my good) kitten showed up on our front porch (almost literally) Sunday morning, so what was I to do? Give it to a shelter that would kill it? I couldn't do that, and so we took it in.

*sigh*

I'm not complaining; it is a cute kitty, and we named it Roxie. It just takes a lot of work. I'll post pictures soon.

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Yeah, that's "soon" relative to my posting schedue, not, you know, what most people consider soon. I'll shoot for this weekend at the latest.

Post New-Year's Update

2008-01-10T10:51:00.000-08:00

I know, I know, I've already had a mixed bag on my resolutions. But you know, two steps forward, one step back, right? If you want my MySpace page updated, give me an idear for a song; that's what is preventing me from doing that. Anyway, I've had several requests for different types of postings, but I'll start with video games because, really, they're the important part. So here are my first 2008 WiiViews:

Boogie: Have I talked about this game before? I played it so long ago, and it was so... lackluster, I can't remember. The singing part is ok, the dancing part is really annoying; but mixing them becomes massively dumb.
Carnival Games: Have you ever played a game that was too realistic? If not, try this. This game surprisingly emulates the actual feel of carnival-style games (Ring Toss, knocking clowns down, etc.) including how incredibly boring those games are. To me, this game sufferred from what so many Wii games suffer from: Too much emphasis on the new motion-sensor controller, not enough attention to actual gameplay. WiiPlay is a better party game than this by far.
Chicken Shoot: When I first got the Wii, I thought to myself "I bet shooting games will be great on this system!" Maybe, but certainly not this game. Chicken Shoot has no plot, no characters, no variety. There are chickens, you shoot them for points. Occasionally, they throw eggs at you. OOOO!! Exciting!! (Please not sarcasm). To borrow a TMQ-style item: In hell, Wii's are everywhere, but the only game is Chicken Shoot.
Mario Party 8: Finally, finally, a good game! Ok, maybe I'm suffering from the "soft bigotry of low expectations," but still, MP8 isn't that bad of a game. The mini-games are varied enough (and there are enough of them) that you aren't just doing the same thing over and over, but it's not too complicated. The boards range from very enjoyable to wierd to downright stupid. I definitely think I benefit from not having played many Mario Party games before this though. Overall, it's a great game for parties, but (due to AI cheating) gets less so the fewer people that play.

I have more (lots more), but that will do for now. Additionally, Brandy (the no-longer-new-girlfriend) is TOTALLY AWESOME and got me an X-Box 360 for Christmas, so expect some reviews for that as well (once I play some games other than Rock Band). I also have plans to talk about the over-performing Lakers and underwhelming political landscape, but now I have to get back to work.

Resolutions

2008-01-01T16:37:00.000-08:00

My New Year's Resolutions:

1. Blog more (at least once a week is my goal; a more realistic certainty is every other week).

2. Update my MySpace page once a month (I'm just not motivated to update it right now, but
before the end of the week I will!).

3. Eat healthier (a low bar for me to clear, to be certain).

4. Master Hard level on Rock Band (damn Orange button!!)

5. Be more social.

I'll let everyone know how these things come along...

Speaking of Fires

2007-10-25T17:24:00.000-07:00

Of course, my thoughts and prayers go out to those who have lost their lives and/or houses to the recent onslaught of fires in SoCal. The smell of fire and smoke has permeated most of southern california this week, and that smell always reminds me of two things:

Wineries and campfires.

So.... on with the stories!

My senior year of high school I picked up a weekend job doing menial tasks at a local winery (for those unfamiliar to the Temecula area, there are about 15-20 wineries there, of varying quality). And by "menial" I mean really menial tasks: Watering plants, labeling wine bottles, stocking shelves, etc. It was seriously me and what I am sure were, uh, "undocumented workers" doing a bunch of random crap. One time I was asked to go out onto the property (probably around 10-15 acres, if not more) and count how many dead vines there were in each row. Like I said, menial.

Anyway, on very, very lucky days during the winter, I was in charge of The Burn Pile. So on those days instead of coming into work around 9 or 10am, I would show up around 5 or 6, and we would gather all the dead vines, grass clippings, and anything else combustible and burn them. I was in charge of maintaining a good sized bonfire. Ahh, good times. As any good Boy Scout does, I love fire and I love burning things; and I got paid to do it! Really, that's the only thing missing from my job nowadays: Burning shit.

Now, on my summer vacations in high school, I would attempt to escape the smoltering heat of the Temecula Valley by fleeing to the moutnains, where I worked at a Scout Camp in Running Springs (to see how Camp Helendade faired during these fires, go here). One thing we would do at the camp is retire flags. Most people know that to retire a flag you "burn it," but it's not quite that simple (nor is it complex, really). The idea is that, yes, you burn a flag to retire it, but you do so with respect and solemnity, remembering what the flag stands for. So, on closing nights every week, our camp would hold a small ceremony, inviting retired and active duty military persons to join us as we retired several flags on our camp fires.

The other important rule of flag retiring is that you MUST let the fire on which you retire the flag die out naturally. That means you can't just douse the flame once you are done with your ceremony. So as anyone familiar with camp fires can attest, fires can take a long time to die out. And so it was with these fires. As such, several members of the staff would sit down at the campfire until the early hours of the morning talking, laughing, drinking Jack Daniels and telling stories until the fires had finally died. Those summers were some of the best times of my life.

*sigh* Damn, I miss those days.

So those are the two memories that have been on the forefront of my mind this past week, as all these fires have been burning.

Fear Not, Fires Have Avoided Me

2007-10-25T12:09:00.001-07:00

Well friends, I know I haven't posted much, but thankfully that isn't because of fires. I spent some time in West Virginia a few weeks ago for a funeral and while I really (really) would never want to live in that state, it is very pretty and I woulnd't mind visiting it more. Or maybe I should just go visit the Appalachain's in general, so I can go look at coolio rocks!

And then Brandy took me away for a romantic weekend. Admittedly, it wasn't very far "away," but it was an incredibly fun, surprising and memorable weekend (with more miniature golfing and bowling included!) that I think we both needed.

So, as always, distractions keep me away. And they continue to pile on; for last night I took on what will certainly be a huge distraction from this here blog: I created a fantasy basketball team.

Scary, huh?

I haven't drafted yet (and I'm doing the easiest version of drafting - not the live draft), but this is my first fantasy sport team and I'm a little scared/nervous/excited. If anyone has thoughts or suggestions, let me know.

I'll be back soon (I hope!), but for now - Lunch!

"Frequent" is a Subjective Term

2007-09-30T07:17:00.000-07:00

Yeah, yeah, I know I suck at this. I have some thoughts on why my posting has been so poor of late; I will get to that later. For now, the updates on my life.

Work goes well. I'm starting to tell the difference between the different types of dirt that I see. Oh, how all of you poor fools miss out. You see a pile of dirt and think "wow, that is really uninteresting dirt." I see it and think: "Wow, that is a sandy silt with few (<5%)>
The Reva will be proud of this one: I've started watching How I Met Your Mother. I stopped watching sit-coms (and most TV as well) when I shipped off to college a few years back, and hadn't gotten back into the spirit of watching them again until very recently. HIMYM is quickly approaching my favorite show, although it has stiff competition, mostly from Two & a Half Men, but also from another show that is a guilty pleasure of mine that I will not mention here lest I get mocked incessantly.
My mom had been out visiting the past two weeks. I wish I could say I spent a lot of time with her, but due to other circumstances (see lower post) she had to leave early, cutting short our visiting time.
Over on National Review Online this weekend has been Star Trek Weekend. They have some interesting articles up. The sum of it is that Star Trek was liberal, Star Wars is conservative. Except for TOS, which is more of a Kennedy-liberal, which in today's poltical climate is practically fascist. Some good reads. (I would provide a link to said article, but that website isn't working at the moment. bah!)
In Transformers news, the DVD for the AWESOME MOVIE is slated to be out October 19th, so go pre-order people! The second movie is now scheduled to be released Summer 2009. I'm excited!
The first Lakers exhibition game is October 9. Who wants bets as to whether the Lakers make the playoffs this year?

So Brandy noted her corruption due to me a while back and I would also like to note that I, too, have been corrupted. For the first time in 24 years on this planet I am excited about a playoff series in a sport other than Basketball. And I can name nearly all the Anaheim Angels starters. And I've been watching football like I care about it! It's definitely wierd, but in a good way. I've started reading TMQ over at ESPN and am getting about half the references. But I'm determined to keep learning about these sports which aren't basketball.

Finally, I have much to say about the style of my blogging, why I haven't done much recently, what I plan on doing to change that, and all that good stuff. But it will have to wait for another post.

On a Personal Note

2007-09-29T08:29:00.000-07:00

My grandmother's taken very ill this weekend; all of your thoughts and prayers are appreciated for her, my mother and the whole family.

What to Post?

2007-08-18T16:59:00.000-07:00

Whenever I'm at work I think of things that I should blog about; then, when I have a moment, like now, and I can blog, I can't remember any of it.

*Sigh*

Oh well. Maybe next time I'll remember.

Mea Culpa

2007-08-12T11:50:00.000-07:00

Sorry folks, moving destroyed my blogging abilities. I'll try to be back on track now.

So, what's all the new deals? Well, first, Colton: Yeah, this is where I live now. Everyone (meaning my mother and Brandy) thinks that Colton/San Bernardino is some horrible ghetto. Now, Brandy's excusable, she's lived here her whole life; she doesn't know any better. But my mom? Come on! Do you remember Berkeley? Like, at all? People's Park ring any bell to you? There's just no way that Colton is worse than Telegraph Avenue. And while yes, there are some parts of San Bernardino I wouldn't want to be in late at night, it's still much, much better than Oakland. To me, that's obvious.

The new job: it's... different. Whereas before I was hitting rocks with a sledge hammer, now I'm... looking at dirt. Seriously. I'm drilling holes in the ground and looking at the sand (or silt!) that comes out. There's a huge learning curve that I'm trying to overcome, but I'm making progress. It is definitely interesting, and I like the geology involved. So far, so good there!

Did I mention Transformers kicks ass? I did? Well, it's worth repeating. The new Transformers movie is totally badass.

My parents have finally made the move to North Carolina. They (and the dogs) made it out there in one piece. Apparently it's hot there in August. Like, really hot and humid.

I love my apartment. It's not fantastic or anything, I just like it; maybe because it's mine.

For my friends who read OOTS (who should be everyone, it's a great webcomic), beware, spoilers ahead:
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So outside of killing Roy, which continues a proud tradition of killing my favorite characters in a show/series/novel, etc. I read the second prequel book "Start of Darkness." It is, of course, extremely well written. It's not quite as funny as the others, mostly because it is far more sad. It has a definite "Episode 3" feel to me, and solidies Redcloak as my favorite (living) character. When/if Roy is ressurrected I'll be quite distressed as to who my favorite is. Meanwhile, I would kick Xycon in the balls... if he had any.
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Not much else new going on here. I'll try to be better at updating; can't promise everything though. I'm thinking of revamping my website as well, focusing on reviewing X-Men comics. Again though, no promises. If you're in Colton of course, feel free to call and check out my place!

Iraq Debate

2007-07-10T08:17:00.001-07:00

It's been a long time since I've done a political post, and I kind of like it that way. Even so, with debate coming soon over Iraq, and reports of the Iraqi political government sucking ass, I feel it is important to emphasize the importance of the mission over there. General Petraeus, US commander in Iraq, has an interview with the New York Post today which I think is a good read. To me, the crucial part:

Q: Now that the surge is fully in place, what's your sense of the positives and negatives thus far? If you could have more of any one item, what would it be? Troops? Time? Iraqi unity?
A: I can think of few commanders in history who wouldn't have wanted more troops, more time or more unity among their partners; however, if I could only have one at this point in Iraq, it would be more time. This is an exceedingly tough endeavor that faces countless challenges.
None of us, Iraqi or American, are anything but impatient and frustrated at where we are. But there are no shortcuts. Success in an endeavor like this is the result of steady, unremitting pressure over the long haul. It's a test of wills, demanding patience, determination and stamina from all involved.

Sadly, this is the one thing he is unlikely to get. Oh, and to keep things in perspective, make sure you're reading some Michael Yon at least sometimes. From a recent dispatch:

The official reported that on a couple of occasions in Baqubah, al Qaeda invited to lunch families they wanted to convert to their way of thinking. In each instance, the family had a boy, he said, who was about 11-years-old. As LT David Wallach interpreted the man's words, I saw Wallach go blank and silent. He stopped interpreting for a moment. I asked Wallach, "What did he say?" Wallach said that at these luncheons, the families were sat down to eat. And then their boy was brought in with his mouth stuffed. The boy had been baked. Al Qaeda served the boy to his family.

Yes. An 11-year old. Shall we really give up and run from these bastards?

Transformers Kicks All Kinds of Ass

2007-07-02T23:27:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I'll post more later, but I saw an advacned screening, and it kicked all sorts of coolness ass. Easily the best movie of the summer; easily.

I'll discuss further later this week, after more people have seen the movie - which I strongly reccomend.

The Big Reveal

2007-07-01T16:32:00.000-07:00

I can't believe that it's been a year since I graduated (more than that, actually).

Damn.

If someone had told me how my life would work out between then and now I would've mocked them; although if somone had told me about how my life would work out post-high school I wouldn't have believed them either. Still, I'm amazed at how my life has worked out.

I expected to get a job as a geologist; instead I work as a geophysicist. I expected my stay at home with my parents to be temporary; it's been slightly longer than that. I would never have expected that Candace would break up with me; nor that I would try an online dating servie, let alone fall madly in love with someone from such a service! At this point, though, I shouldn't be surprised by such things. God has proven to me over and over that nothing works out like I expect it to. So be it; I have faith that things will work out in the end.

Nonetheless, this summer will prove to be one of changes for me. So let's start listing them: My parents are - finally - moving out to North Carolina. As for me, I am leaving my employment at GEOVision to take a job as a Staff Geologist at CHJ, Inc. As such, I will be moving out to Colton, CA which, for those who don't know, is basically between Riverside and Redlands on the I-215.

Whew. So there you have it folks; the big news I've been waiting to tell everyone. If you want my new address, let me know and I will send it to you; additionally, if you want a birthday/Christmas card from me, get me your contact info and I will ensure that you receive one.

Pirates 3 Sucked

2007-07-01T16:26:00.000-07:00

Sorry Candace.

I wanted to like it; really. And it was better than the second one; unfortuantely it was better in the same way that Episode II was better than Episode I: The first was so bad that the following one had to be better; and it wasn't that much better. It seems that At World's End's major problem was that there were too many subplots that just kept... going... on... forever. So much so that when something finally happened you were too bored with the movie to pay attention!

The thought that I had during the movie was that it would be better served as a series, like Lost. Then it could take all the time it wanted in fleshing out its subplots with no 2-hour or so time limit. Not that something like that is going to to happen.

Meanwhile, Will Turner kicked major ass! He went from "whiny, self-righteous pansy" in the first one to "total freakin' badass" in the final one. He was practically the only thing worth watching in the film (like Ewen McGregor in Episode II, ironically). The scene between him and Davy Jones was my favorite by far.

Personally, I hope that there aren't more of the films, or at lesat if there are that they keep a better, faster pace. I don't know what genre this film was, but "action" definitely wasn't it.

True Story

2007-06-30T09:10:00.000-07:00

So we hired a special consultant to help us out on a job this week, and he came out on Tuesday. I met him, and he seemed nice enough, but something about him bugged me. I couldn't tell quite what, maybe the long hipppy-esque hair, but I wasn't sure. As I got to working with him he seemed like a nice enough guy; willing to work hard and good at his job.

So the second night on the job we're talking about a variety of things and he mentions: "So I went to graduate school at Stanford."

DUN DUN DUN!!!!!

It all made sense then; I sensed his Stanfurdness, and it bugged me. Out of professional courtesy, I forced myself to not respond with a "Fuck Stanfurd" when he told me. But I could only barely hold it in.

sigh

2007-06-25T22:28:00.001-07:00

I'm bored. And stressed. And can't sleep. And I'm working nights the rest of this week.

*sigh*

It's going to be a long week indeed.

Baseball News

2007-06-24T19:06:00.001-07:00

Not something you'll hear from me much, but here's a favorite headline of mine:

"First Professional Baseball Game Kicks Off in Israel"

PETAH TIKVA, Israel — Puzzled broadcasters calling the first
professional baseball game in Israeli history struggled with rendering baseball
lingo into the holy tongue of Hebrew.
After a valiant effort at
translating some of the terms, they gave up — lacing their broadcast with
Hebrew-accented versions of ball, strike, out, majors, pitcher and base
hit.
Otherwise, the game looked and sounded like real baseball on a minor
league level, though it seemed as out of place in the Holy Land as polo in Manhattan.
There were no peanuts, no Cracker Jack, no
"Star-Spangled Banner." Three thousand fans cheered as the Modiin Miracles beat
the Petah Tikva Pioneers, 9-1.
Wire fences ringed the field, and bleachers
were set up along the foul lines. A fast food and snack stand did good business
on the sidelines, selling hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken and soft drinks — all
kosher, of course. The pitchers were a bit on the wild side, and some of the
fielding was sloppy.

First baseball game in 5,000 years. Cool beans.

George Lucas is a Scumbag

2007-06-24T18:09:00.000-07:00

First, a Star Wars/movie question:

If someone has not seen any of the Star Wars movies, is it better to watch them in episodic order (i.e. Episode I - VI), or in order of theatrical release (the original trilogy first, then the prequels)? I'm sure that it is impossible to have "spoilers" for the later films, as most of the major plot points everyone knows, but which order do people think is better?

Second, George Lucas is an ass-hole. I watched Garden State this weekend (how I dated Candace for 4 years and never watched this is beyond me, but I digress), and dammit Natalie Portman is a good actress in it! It took me a while to realize this because for the first half of the movie all I could think of is thats scene is Episode III where she's bitching to Anakin about holding her. *shudder* Once I came to my realization, I was irritated at Lucas for being such a horrible director, and screwing up which should have been good movies. Damn you Lucas.

Now, following is a discussion on the current Star Wars novels, and will contain spoilers to things which have occurred post Return of the Jedi. Be warned.
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Yeah, the dots mean spoilers, read on only if you don't care.
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Ok. I recently finished the book Betrayl, which is Book 1 of the new "Legacy of the Force" series.

So, if you remember, Anakin became Darth Vader mainly out of a desire to save his wife, Padme. He had visions of her dying, and Palpatine/Sidious promised that the Dark Side had the power to save her; thus, in a Faustian manner, Skywalker sold his soul. This, to me, epitomized the old Jedi rule that Jedi's were not supposed to have attachments, as they often led to problems. So far, so good right?

So, following ROTJ, Luke Skywalker sets out to re-establish the Jedi order, training young Jedi and so forth. Now, I read one of the most recent books, taking place some 40 years after the fall of the Empire, so imagine my shock to learn that not only is Luke Skywalker a Jedi, and not only is his sister, Princess Leia a jedi, but both of their kids' are Jedi as well!!! And both of them are married; Luke to another freakin' Jedi!! To me, this makes no sense, and goes contrary to the way that I would think that the Jedi Order should be run. And this particular book proves my objections: Han Solo and the Galactic Alliance, whom the Jedi's work for/with, are on opposing sides of a political dispute. Leia (a Jedi, remember) goes out of her way to lie and decieve the GA in order to protect her husband. The fact that a wife wants to protect her husband is no shock to anyone in love, but, as Leia's own father proved, is potentially disastrous to a Jedi. What else will she to protect Han? Steal? Kill? To me, this seems to be the path to the Dark Side. The only one who stays true to the Jedi form, despite his attachments, was Luke, who did not interfere or try to pursuade another Jedi's decision to take Luke's son, Ben Skywalker, on a dangerous mission. Luke recognized that Ben's instructor was best suited to make the decision on weather he was ready to go, not the boy's father.

Sadly, this isn't the only problem I have with the mythos's changing opinions. The end of the book spends quite a bit of time painting moral equivalence between the Light and Dark sides of the Force, arguing that the "dark side" wasn't inherently evil, but rather, was used by evil people. The dark force user who was making these arguments was trying to seduce a young Jedi, Jacen Solo (yeah, Han and Leia's kid, raise your hand if you didn't see that one coming) into being the newest Sith Lord. Crouched in terms remarkably similar to Palpatine's to Anakin Skywalker, this woman talked about how the Dark Side could bring peace and justice, if only the evil Jedi Knights didn't supress it.

Now, another Jedi was with Jacen, and she wanted to arrest the dark force-user (as she was a confessed criminal), but Jacen stopped her - for the greater good. He saw a future of death and destruction if the dark person was arrested, so he killed another Jedi. This immediately calls to mind Anakin's killing of Samuel L. Jackson, err... Mace Windu, and annoys me because you would think that Luke and Leia Skywalker, of all people, would teach their kids the follies of believing the tempation of the power of the Dark Side. Alternatively, the Star Wars franchise wants to make the argument that the Dark Side isn't evil, in which case I'm just annoyed that they are doing so.

So now I'm trying to go back and read earlier books, to see why Luke made the choices he made in organizing the Jedi in this manner, and trying to read the newer books, to see if the moral equivalence continues. In both ways, I'm hoping that the new Star Wars books don't continue to irritate me.

Gah!

2007-06-19T10:02:00.000-07:00

Work sometimes takes so much out of me, I get home and have zero motivation to do much other than sleep. But, alas, there is much to discuss, and, if my brother updated, I had better too.

A quartet of states have been added to my list of "Been there, even if only in passing." Maryland, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Connecticut. Now, I can here The Reva thinking: "Wait, Maryland is near me in DC, why didn't I get a phone call?" Relax, I was in MD for about two hours total, an hour layover waiting for a flight to NH, and one coming home.

So yeah, last weekend I did an overnight job in Connecticut, which is a long flight and drive for me. But I thought about some interesting things, mostly Star Wars related (I'll get to those in a different post, no need to nerd-out here). Brandy's birthday is coming up, and I'm excited about at least some of the gifts I've bought her. Of course, I am half-wondering if my excitement means it would be a great gift for me, not so much for her...

Sometime within the next two weeks (hopefully) I am going to have an important post up: important as in "My life is changing dramatically" type post. Stay focused. In the meantime keep counting down the days until July 4, when Greatness Arrives.

Stupidity at its Finest

2007-06-04T17:10:00.000-07:00

eHarmony is being sued because they aren't a gay dating service. From a Rueters article:

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The popular online dating service eHarmony was sued
on Thursday for refusing to offer its services to gays, lesbians and
bisexuals.
A lawsuit alleging discrimination based on sexual orientation was
filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on behalf of Linda Carlson, who was denied
access to eHarmony because she is gay.

*Sigh*

The stupidity of this lawsuit irritates me greatly, but not as much as the fact that they will probably win the lawsuit. I kinda hope that the person suing (a lesbian from San Francisco, no surprise there) is doing so because she wants to make the quick buck, not because she actually believes that all dating services must offer every kind of combination.

More Mini-Reviews

2007-05-29T13:42:00.000-07:00

Let's get this out of the way first: I was tired, sore and half-asleep, but yes, I watched an episode of the Bachelor. I was quite irritated at it, to be honest. Watching the season finale I had two choices of women to support: On the one hand, there was the social worker from San Francisco (read: hippie); on the other hand was a medical researcher from Palo Alto. My only thought was: "I have to choose between supporting a hippie from SF or a freakin' Stanfurd girl? WTF?" It was worse than the NBA playoffs (I'm rooting for Detroit?? WTF?)! I tried to mock the show at every opportunity, but I still feel dirty for having watched it.

I also saw Hitch. Now I wanted to see this movie in theaters because I really like Kevin James, and I kinda-sorta like Will Smith. Having now seen it, I'm glad I didn't see it in theaters. Don't get me wrong, it was a decent movie, and I generally liked it, but I'm not sure I liked it enough to have spent nine bucks on it. It was cute though. In a girly-chick-flick type way.

Less girly was Hard Candy, a pshychological thriller featuring the chick who played Kitty Pryde in X-Men 3. I'll never look at her the same; that is a seriously messed up movie. I didn't like it for a variety of reasons, none of them revolving around the quality of the movie. It's worth a look if you are interested in the genre. I'll have more to say on it later, the issues it brings up warrant a full post (though I wonder if I'll actually get around to posting about it, given my track record on these things).

I also saw Shrek the Third; it was... meh. I enjoyed it, but nowhere near as much as the first two. I don't think I would've seen it had Antonio Banderas not been in the movie; he's too much of a badass to not make a movie better. The D&D reference was at once funny and mildly insulting. Thanks for reinforcing a stereotype guys!

I haven't yet seen Pirates, which of course means I haven't played the Wii game of it, lest I get spoilers. But I'm told it's good!

I'm also proud to say that I've made Brandy watch Team America: World Police. Whereas in the beginning of the movie she wasn't thrilled with the theme song, by the end, when I said "America," she vigorously responded. My work then is done.

Well that's it for now; a Happy Birthday to me, I'll be back with all of you before the week is out hopefully.

Updates are A-Comin'

2007-05-24T19:06:00.000-07:00

Yeah, yeah, I'll give some more... serious updating soon. On what? Well, Brandy has helped me suffer through a variety of movies and television shows, so I have to share with you all my opinions of Hitch, Hard Candy, and the season finale of the Bachelor. --Oh, God, did I just type that I need to blog about THE BACHELOR??? Sweet Christmas, what have I become? -- But this weekend involves playing WiiPirates - err... The Pirates of the Carribean Wii game - and my birthday! :) So I'll update everyone on those things soon. See, unlike some people, I don't like giving one sentence responses on movies that I watch. Let's see, if this were a television commercial, here's where I leave a cliffhanger that could CHANGE EVERYTHING, so here it is: major changes are a-comin' in the next month or so. I hope to have more info within a week or two, so, you know, keep watching.

And now the best part of my day thus far: I received an email this morning (spam!) dated January 24.
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2038.

Goodnight folks.

Sweet Christmas

2007-05-17T18:45:00.000-07:00

Sweet Independence Day is more like it.

It took four tries, but finally, finally, there's a good Transformers trailer. And it's a doozy.

One fan's take:

Is it wrong to cry with excitement over a film based on toys? Oh, we know
it's not going to win any Oscars (well, except effects ones - look how shiny and
photo-real!) and, if you think about it, the plot is as daft as a box of drunk
badgers. But the robots! The big fighty robots! With the smashing! And the being
one thing, then another! One, like, really big thing, then another really big
thing – with guns!

WiiView

2007-05-13T06:07:00.000-07:00

God, that's a bad pun, even for me.

I'm sure you will all be pleased to know that I/we finally got through the damn fishing experience in Zelda. And, after two hours of gameplay, finally got a damn sword. Just a wooden one, mind you. So now what are my opinions? I'm not a big fan of the sword slicing technique. You have to swing the Wii-Remote, which is ok, I think I'm just used to having a button to smash, but you put your sword away really quickly. Also, I'm having a bit of trouble adjusting to the camera movement. The Remote/Nunchuk vs. normal controller is difficult mostly because it's different. If in most video games the controller (metaphorically) requires you to pat your head and rub your stomach, this set up requires you pat your elbow while rubbing your knee. I can do it, but it takes me a little while to figure out the best way how. Next week I actually get to go out into the world and meet the Princess; how exciting.

Wii Sports is definitely growing on me. I kinda really like the boxing one; it certainly can easily build up a sweat. Although that shouldn't surprise me, considering the Wii Fitness program says I'm an age of 53. And still I'm carded at bars! I guess I'm gonna have to work on that one...

I also played Paper Super Mario. On the plus side; they attempted to add a plot. On the down side; they attempted to add a plot. What's the plot you ask? Well, basically take Kingdom Hearts, delete any cool Square-Enix characters, replace Donald and Goofy with Mario and a freakin' butterfly polygon and there you have it. Someone other than Bowser has kidnapped the Princess, and now you have to stop him from using The Void from destroying all the worlds!! I would prefer to stick with Sora, thanks, although I can imagine some women-folk finding the game cute and funny. I wonder if it was imported from the DS... The only really interesting part of the game is the "dimensional switch" where you can change from a side-scrolling, 2-D map to a 3-D one for a short time. This reveals special pathways and secrets. I think it is really neat, to be honest.

Oh, and the villain's name is Count Bleck, and he refers to himself in the third person constantly. It's fantastic.

A Blending of Nerdiness

2007-05-10T10:16:00.000-07:00

So apparently, National Review Online is having s "Star Trek Day." It seems they will be having Stark Trek-themed conservative gear such as T-shirts which say: "Live Long and Cut Taxes." This almost freaks out even me. Nonetheless, I know I'll be buying at least one of these shirts for Phil, does anyone else want one?

UPDATE: Here are some of the other possibilities. Me, I'm for the Four Lights one.

Goin' Mapping

2007-05-08T12:50:00.000-07:00

Behold! A map of the Internet!

I've always enjoyed mapping, from my Boy Scouting youth to my geological mapping college days to even now mapping subsurface utilities, something about mapping is really satisfying to me. Of course, this particular map also has the joy of looking like a Dungeons & Dragons or Final Fantasy map, so maybe that's why I enjoy it so much. Meh. I think it's cool.

h/t Candace.

Reviews

2007-05-06T12:19:00.000-07:00

Work once more has kept me away from my adoring reader(s?), but now I am back with some updates! Specifically, some reviews:

Nintendo Wii: Well, after spending 20 minutes playing a friend's, the new girlfriend Brandy went out and bought her very own Wii, along with a variety of games. Needless to say, I've spent some time playing it. And, well, my only reaction is: Meh. Where other consoles (*cough*PS3*cough) have spent an enormous amount of time and effort making graphics improvements, Nintendo seems to have focused on changing the way the games are played. And in that, they have been hugely sucsessful. The Wii remote - which senses your movements and follows it on the screen - is amazingly accurate and sensitive (sometimes too sensitive). And certainly, it's pretty neat to bowl or golf or whatever using the actual motions. But, once the initial coolness fades, you're left wondering "Is this it?" Currently, there are precious few games which could be graciously described as "good" on the system. Wii Sports is basically a tech demo that Nintendo decided to package with the game and has graphics that the N64 could beat; the only Mario game is freakin' Paper Super Mario? Come on. Even the new Zelda game (see below for more on that) has been released on the GameCube, so why bother buying a system for it? I can see the Wii putting out some really neat shooters, the Remote and Nunchuk thing (that's its name, seriously) seem well-suited for that, but where are they now? A new Metroid game in that fashion would've done wonders for the system! Instead, we're left with WiiPlay and Smooth Moves. So, in summary: A fun party system, with a neat, innovative style of gaming, that will make some really neat shooters eventually, but thus far I'll keep my PS2. Maybe the Pirates of the Carribbean game that's coming out this summer wil change my mind.

Legend of Zelda - Twilight Princess: Ah, the new Zelda game for the Wii. Let's start with sometihing positive: It's pretty. Not quite Final Fantasy XII pretty, but pretty in any case. Also, there's still no voice acting, which may or may not be a bad thing. And, unlike the last Zelda game I played, Ocarina of Time, you don't start out as a little kid, and the damnable fairy doesn't keep trying to tell you things. Other than that, it's a standard Zelda game of solving puzzles and collecting items to stop the bad guy. Well, I have to assume most of that last sentence, because I've spent the last half-hour playing trying to do one stupid task: Catch a damn fish! Apparently, the most frustrating part of the game comes right at the beginning, and it's a doozy. Now, I know that - in real life - people spend hours sipping beers and fishing. But, when I play a game, I dont' need that much reality involved. Catching a damn fish within the first hour of play shouldn't be this damn hard! But it seems that Link's a Druid in this game (sorry, D&D reference) since he can turn into a Wolf later on. If/When I get past the fishing, I'll update you all.

Runaways: A friend let me borrow the colleciton of comics titled Runaways. It's good. Really good. The story is: Six teenagers find out that their parents are part of a secret cabal of super-villains and so they run away from home, each gaining or learning about special powers of their own along the way. It also includes a genetically engineered dinosaur from the 87th century. Always helpful with a book. It's really well written and neatly drawn; I would encourage everyone to read it, as it's not your typical spandex-wearing superhero smackdowns.

Spider-Man 3: A great movie. I mean, a really great movie. A lot of stuff goes happens, as contrasted to, say, Superman Returns, where nothing happens. There are a few scenes that don't make sense, but overall, a very well done finale to the trilogy. And Kirsten Dunst is a bitch. Her MJ is going on my Emma Frost list (*sigh* more of my friends need to read comics). Anyway, go see it.

Great Weekend Fun (Update)

2007-04-22T09:33:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of updates of late, being out of town for work tends to exhaust me, leaving me little time for updates. That said, I leave again to be out of town all week on Monday, so prepare yourselves for another week with scant contact from me.

In the meantime, though, I was home this weekend, and what a wonderful weekend it was! I simply cannot fully express how much I enjoyed this weekend. I only wish I could say what made it so great; really I didn't do anything but hang out with the new girlfriend Brandy. But that was really (really) fun. I did take my first trip to a Dave & Buster's restaurant. Now, I had seen commercials for this place, but had never been and I must say, I really really want to like it there. I mean, where else could I sit, drink beer and play video games all at the same time? Without looking like a hermit by sitting at home? But the choices of video games was... subpar at best. No good fighting games, no good "classic" games. Anyone remember that old, 80s X-Men game? Man, if that were there, I would be in heaven. So, I guess the best way to sum it up would be that I like the concept, if not the execution.

So two things need to occur for this weekend to slide into my Best-Weekend-Ever spot: First, my parents (and dogs!) need to like Brandy, whom they are meeting this evening for dinner; Second, the Lakers need to beat the Suns. If these things happen, this will definitely be solidified as Best-Weekend-Ever. I wouldn't bet on it, though. I have high hopes for the first criteria, the second, not so much.

UPDATE: As expected, dinner with the family was good, the Lakers less so. So Labor Day maintains its spot as Best-Weekend-Ever, with this past one coming in a damn close second. How close? Well, my German Shepard didn't even bark at Brandy. That's how good.

Out of Towning

2007-04-14T17:55:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of updates this week folks, but I was in the field all week, and even now am out of town for work. I'm up in Goleta, near Santa Barbara. It's really (really) pretty, but there's nothing around. It's gonna be a long trip, and I can't wait to get home.

Soooo... in other news, I suppose I might as well share my wonderful news of the week: I met someone last weekend (Holy Saturday, actually) and am just crazy about her. Her name is Brandy, and while we met online, she is most definately not one of those crazy ones that you can meet. She is wonderful, and my heart is filled to overflowing with happiness every time I see her, which hasn't been much I regret to say, having been in the field and out of town all week. She hasn't met my parents yet (or the dogs, for that matter) so wish us luck on that, as she will be just as soon as I get back into town.

Oh yeah: our first date was bowling. Of course I lost, but I had a great time. Of course I had dinner in Perris (not to be confused with dinner in Paris) with her and had a great time as well, so I wonder if it's possible to go out and not have a great time with her.

I'm sore and tired from work, but I will try to keep everyone updated on life. Someone let me know if the world ends while I'm away, God knows I won't notice.

God, Love & Relationships (UPDATED)

2007-04-07T07:45:00.000-07:00

I debated quite a lot about posting this; I didn't know if it was appropriate. And then I thought: "Well, if I can't write about this stuff on my blog, where the hell can I?" And, Easter's a pretty good time to do this. So, here goes:

For a long time I’ve felt that in a relationship Love is all that you need to make it work (yes yes, a cliché to be certain, but one I strongly believe in). I of course have had arguments about this with friends of mine who just as strongly disagree. So me, being me, have been thinking about the “why” behind my belief. After weeks of thinking, I believe I have come up with a response, or at least the beginning of one.

It begins with God. Christian theology teaches that God is pure Love. Everything that God does and plans are acts of Love. Our relationship with Him is based on us loving him. When we stop loving Him, our relationship with Him weakens. God’s Love is perfect.

So if Love was able, through God, to create the world and perform all the miracles, then why couldn’t it make a relationship work? If God is Love, and through God all things are possible, why isn’t Love all you need to make a relationship work? Although I had this discussion originally in terms of a romantic relationship, I believe that all relationships, be they familial, platonic or romantic are based on Love, though different types of love. Take an example of mine: My best friend Micah and I shouldn’t like each other. We are so different, in every aspect, that we shouldn’t be able to stand each other. I’m the guy he would beat up in high school; he’s the guy I looked down at. But because we met so early in childhood we developed a close bond and our love for each other makes us friends in spite of all our differences. We’ve both done things that would normally make us stop talking to each other, but we don’t, because we love each other too much to just write off our friendship.

So I don’t’ think you can say: “I love you but that’s not enough to stay in the relationship.” If you love someone enough, then that is all you need. A more accurate statement might be: “I don’t love you enough to make the relationship work.” Or again: “I don’t believe you love me enough to make this work.” Or what I would guess would be the most accurate: “I don’t have enough faith in our Love that we can make this work.”

Perhaps most people just feel this way and don’t express it correctly. I’m not sure. It’s possible that when someone says “love isn’t enough” what they mean is “I don’t love you enough” and just don’t know. But this is what I’ve come up with thus far. Obviously, this may stir up some feelings in people; this is one of those subjects that I really want to have a discussion about. I welcome your comments and opinions about this, because this is a hypothesis that is still forming in my head, and I think it needs to be challenged and tested (do I sound like a scientist or what?).

Anyway, I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter (or Passover!).

UPDATE: I respond to Mike's comments below. Now that I think on it, I should've done it here. He raises an interesting point, but one that I dont' feel diminishes from my own point of view.

Gas Guzzling, Beer Brewing, and Soul Searching...

2007-04-05T20:06:00.000-07:00

Well, I wish I could say I've been busy this week... but then I'd be lying. In reality I've been working at the office, which is code for "doing not a whole lot and getting paid decent money," but whatever. I spent last Sunday making some beer with my buddy and his dad. That was a pretty neat experience. I think everyone should be forced to make some beer on their own, just to say you've done it. It's still fermenting, I'll let you know how it turns out in a few weeks though.

In other news, some of you may have heard that the EPA changed the way they formulated how much gas mileage your car gets. I was so busy at work, I looked mine up! Turns out my mileage went down from an average of 31mpg to 27mpg. Disappointing, but not terrible.

Actually, it reminds me of a West Wing episode. Some agency came up with a new way to calculate the number of people living in poverty and it, of course, went up. The best spin that they could put on it was that there aren't more poor people, we're just noticing more of them. I don't have worse gas mileage, I'm just noticing how poor the mileage is.

Moving on....

It's decision time here at Romano central: What to do, what to do... Some decisions are made for me, some I gotta make on my own. I got no clue what I'm gonna do, NC or CA? Corona or Temecula? *sigh*

I know, I know: Leif's a bitch, right?

Warning: D&D Reference Ahead:

2007-04-02T09:11:00.000-07:00

So I saw this post on NRO where someone (half-jokingly) argued that having a "conservative political outlook" makes you more able and likely to defend yourself and I couldn't help but ask:

"So if one of my D&D players espouses conservative political thoughts in-game, that gives... what, a +2 Competency bonus on their AC?"

One day I'm going to stop having thoughts like this, and I'm not sure if that will be a good day or a bad day...

Defining "Bored"

2007-03-31T20:04:00.000-07:00

So back when I was at Bezerkeley, I thought I never went out. I mean, what did I do? Go to BCR? Occasionally parties down at Chilton? Sometimes I was out with Candace's co-workers. But pretty low-key. I thought I never did anything.

When I moved home last May I thought: "Wow! So at Berkeley i went out a lot! This must be what doing nothing's like!" I mean, what did I do? Spend most weekends with Candace and sometimes get drunk with Eric? Not terribly exciting. Which isn't to say I wasn't happy! On the contrary, I can think of fewer times in my life that I was happier than last fall. I just thought I didn't do much.

But now, oh now, I realize just how much I used to go out. Now I find myself re-defining boredom on an almost daily basis. I do absolutely nothing these days. Just how bored am I? Well, I'm filling out MySpace surveys, so that should clue in anyone who knows me at all how bored. But there's something worse: I sit at home and I'm bored of reading comic books and playing video games!

I pretty much went to college just to sit in my apartment and read comic books and play video games! And now I don't want to! Ugh! Then I watch the Lakers get womped by every team out there and I think that everything that I used to enjoy is being taken from me!

I need to get out more; I need to do something...

Well, I have a plan, dammit! And let's just hope The Reva was right when I talked to her a month ago...

Lakers Update

2007-03-30T20:31:00.000-07:00

So, I'm watching the Lakers play the Houston Rockets and I'm thinking:

Yao Ming is really, really ugly.

I feel bad thinking this, 'casue I'm not one to speak, but damn. I mean, he doesn't look bad in the picture, but on television, it's just... ugly.

Damn.

Traffic Sucks

2007-03-30T19:06:00.000-07:00

It's really saying something when I choose to take the 91 Freeway over the I-15.

It's worse when the 91 has the best traffic my entire drive home.

Maybe God's trying to tell me I should move.

Many, Many Updates

2007-03-29T19:59:00.000-07:00

Wow, that's a lot of updates today! Yikes! Yeah, I was pretty bored at work today, and had to fight the strong urges to do those evil MySpace surveys. God save me when this weekend comes... Anyway, make sure you scroll down and see all the cool things I posted!

How Embarrassing...

2007-03-29T15:41:00.000-07:00

State Senator Abel Maldonado is proposing a toll-free number for people to call to report.....

CARPOOL LANE ABUSE!

Yes folks, because when I think of the most important things facing my great state of California, what do I think of? People abusing the carpool lane. Good God. Hey, it oculd be worse, he could try to tell me what kind of light bulbs to use.

By the way, no, that is definitely NOT me and Candace precinct walking for Abel. Must be some kind of conspiracy.

*Sigh* I'm so ashamed.

Strangest Story Ever

2007-03-29T14:49:00.000-07:00

My favorite author Mark Steyn shows me the story that keeps getting better:

It starts:

A man charged with deliberately spreading HIV allegedly tricked his lover - who had registered himself with the local council as a dog - into having unsafe sex on the basis he could not transmit the disease.

Let's take this one phrase at a time: First, a man is charged with intentionally spreading HIV - a fairly disgusting charge to begin with -but he " tricked his lover - who had registered himself with the local council as a dog." Wow. This story is already bizarre. So HIV guy's lover registered himself as a dog??? Can I do that? I would love to be a freakin' dog! Second"with the council"? What council? I really don't know. And finally, some idiot believed that someone HIV positive couldn't transmit the disease? What kind of strange concoction of a story must that have been? But let's continue:

Melbourne Magistrates Court heard yesterday that Michael Neal, 48, accepted a dog tag from his lover as a "sign of commitment" in their master-slave relationship.

Kinky? Yes. But it's a sad day indeed when the above is the most normal sentence in the whole damn story.

[He] allegedly "deliberately contracted" HIV by having sex on the altar of a Catholic Church with two men he knew were HIV-positive.

First, read that statement a few more times, and let it sink in.

..
..

Ok. Now, this guy is seriously messed up in the head.

The witness yesterday told the court he was in love with Mr. Neal.
"I was pretty much besotted by him and under his spell, which made me very gullible and stupid," the man's statement said.

Indeed. The story goes on, and I swear it's not by The Onion; I mean, I know it's a messed up story, but I just can't read it and not freakin' laugh.

Bush Jokes

2007-03-29T13:28:00.000-07:00

I quite enjoyed reading President Bush's remarks from the Radio and Television Correspondants' Annual Dinner. Agree or disagree with his politics, there were some funny lines there. Among my favorites:

A year ago, my approval rating was in the 30s, my nominee for the Supreme Court had just withdrawn, and my Vice President had shot someone. (Laughter and applause.) Ahhh, those were the good old days."
"I have to admit we really blew the way we let those attorneys go. You know you botched it when people sympathize with lawyers."
"Considering what's next -- President Clinton, of course, wrote a very successful presidential memoir, with 10,000 pages or something. (Laughter.) I'm thinking of something really fun and creative for mine -- you know, maybe a pop-up book."
"[I]t's good to see Speaker Pelosi tonight. (Laughter.) Well, some have wondered how the two of us would get along. Some say she's bossy, she's opinionated, she's not to be crossed. Hey, I get along with my mother."

Most touching to me though were his comments of sympathy and good wishes not just for Tony Snow, but also for Elizabeth Edwards:

"Someone who is not here tonight is Tony Snow. (Applause.) When Tony called me and told me the outcome of his surgery, my heart just sank. But I know Tony is a fighter. And, Tony, we're all looking forward to the day when you come back to the White House. (Applause.) Last week we all heard the news about Elizabeth Edwards, and again, your heart just sinks for what she and her family faces."

A real class act I say.

And speaking of Mr. Snow and Mrs. Edwards, NRO points to some websites to send your good wishes.

South Park

2007-03-29T12:56:00.000-07:00

Now, I haven't watched the infamous show in a long while, though I'm a huge fan, but I read a strange synopsis of their most recent episode and how to ask:

Has South Park jumped the Shark?

I hate to say this, because I love the show so much, but reading about last night's episode I couldn't help but wonder: WTF? It sounds wierder than a Family Guy episode, and less funny. I'm not sure what it is: Perhaps any show which focuses on Hillary Clinton's genitalia is... distressing to me; or maybe the odd way Cartman decides to pick on the Muslim kid, or perhaps I dislike the Queen killing herself. I dunno, but the whole things feels... wrong to me.

My caveat to all of this is that I think most South Park episodes sound ridiculously stupid - who would've thought my favorite episode would involve a talking towel that gets high all the time? - so maybe it's just one of those episodes you need to see to enjoy. I hope so. I would hate for South Park to start sucking.

I Need a Life

2007-03-28T18:44:00.000-07:00

I'm so bored recently I keep wanting to fill out those damnable MySpace surveys about "What's your favorite thing" and "When's the last time you did this" crap. I HATE those things. But I keep having desires to fill them out. I need to get out more.

*Sigh*

Why I love Dogs, Part 2,394

2007-03-27T20:43:00.000-07:00

Here.

Toby, a 2-year-old golden retriever, really is man's best friend — or in this case, woman's. Debbie Parkhurst, a 45-year-old jewelry artist who lives in Calvert, Md., says her dog Toby saved her life last week after she began to choke on a piece of apple by giving her the Heimlich maneuver, the Cecil Whig reported. Parkhurst was home alone Friday afternoon eating a snack of sliced apples when one became lodged in her windpipe. After smacking herself against a chair to dislodge it, she started beating herself on the chest, which she thinks alerted Toby to the problem. "The next think I know, Toby’s up on his hind feet and he’s got his front paws on my shoulders," she told the Cecil Whig. "He pushed me to the ground, and once I was on my back, he began jumping up and down on my chest."

Even if cats were physically able to do that, they wouldn't. Of course, I don't think my dogs would save me either. One's too stpuid, one's too lazy, and the other is too easily distracted by pigeons outside. So I'm pretty screwed, but most people with normal dogs should be fine.

h/t NRO.

Movie Madness

2007-03-27T07:46:00.000-07:00

So here are some movie notes for all you who care:

First, Transformers: Hugo Weaving appears to have been selected to voice Megatron. Weaving is best known for his roles in The Matrix movies (as Agent Smith) and in V for Vendetta. I personally was hoping for David Kaye, whose voiced Megatron on the Transformers cartoon shows since the mid-90s show Beast Wars, but hey, I won't be complaining about this.

Then Iron Man: Many don't know that Marvel's armored avenger is set to be in his own live action movie coming out in 2008. Strangely enough, it looks good. Among its cast are Robert Downey Jr., Gweneth Paltrow, Terrence Howard and Jeff Bridges. Now, Marvel has had some poor choices in casting in the past (see: Daredevil), but these all seem like good moves! I'm actually pretty excited about this movie. It's the most promising sounding franchise since Spider-Man, IMHO. Now I can't wait for an Avengers movie.

Kobe Bryant is a Beast

2007-03-27T07:39:00.000-07:00

I was concerned there for a while about the Lakers. Shame on me. I should have known Kobe Bryant wouldn't let me down. His recent streak has brought the Lakers out of the free fall they were in and solidly in sixth place, where they will almost certainly be taking on the San Antonio Spurs in the first round. Tough match up, but we'll see. Kobe can do it. Know why I think that? Because he's the best player in the league. Period. Though he'll never be accepted as that. As ESPN's Jemele Hill says:

"Kobe can't please anyone... Kobe will never be forgiven for Shaq's departure... The shame of it is that Kobe might finish his career without a MVP, even though his ability can be compared only to that of Jordan and Wilt Chamberlain. All this time we've been looking for a player who is better than Jordan, but most of us can't get beyond whether we like or dislike Kobe as a person to recognize his contributions to the game."

How will the Lakers fare in the playoffs? Who knows; all I can say is that it'll be damn fun to watch. I hope the Lakers stay healthy enough to keep competitive. April come sooner...

A Hard Week

2007-03-25T08:37:00.000-07:00

As predicted, the last week at work was brutal. I travelled out near Glamis, CA to do some seismic refraction and resistivity work there. I worked 18 hours on Thursday, about 15 on Friday and got paid for 8 each day. Some days...

As if that wasn't irritating enough, I forgot my work boots at the office, so I was left destroying a pair of tennis shoes instead, so now I have to go back out and buy some shoes. And it rained on us, not that that stopped us from working straight through it. So now my legs are sore from swinging a 20-lb. sledge hammer, my hands are sore from pounding in 112 stakes into the ground, and my neck is sore from carrying a crap load of equipment.

Not a pleasant week, but at least it's over. Times like this, I wish I had a desk job...

Here's Another Reference No One Will Get...

2007-03-25T06:11:00.000-07:00

But right now, I feel like Archangel in X-Factor #86 (during the X-Cutioner's Song). I know, no one cares. But I do, so it's ok.

One day, someone will get my references and I'll be elated. "Until that day..."

Phone Service

2007-03-20T19:51:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting story I meant to tell you all about from a few weeks ago:

So I had The Reva's phone number saved into my phone from when we were at Cal together. A few months back I tried to call it, but got a wrong number. I figured she must have changed it when she went to Duke. So when I was planning on being in North Carolina, I emailed her and asked for her number so we could get together. She emailed me her number, and once I was in Durham I typed it into my phone and gave her a call. But when I dialed the number it came up as the same number I had saved. The Reva answered the phone, so I thought maybe there had just been a mixup when I had called the first time.

The next day I called again, but this time calling from the number saved into my phone, and AGAIN got a wrong number! But when I later manually re-dialed the EXACT SAME NUMBER I got The Reva.

Weird Shit.

See, This is Why...

2007-03-19T17:30:00.000-07:00

I didn't want to have a MySpace account and/or blog. Twice now, I've decided to write something interesting on MySpace but feel compelled to share it with those who read here, but not there.

"But John," my rational voice cries, "why not just keep MySpace and dump this blog?" "Because Krista, I hate MySpace with the same ardor which I hate hippies with, so to sacrifice this Blogger account, run by my masters Google, would be borderline blasphemous. And it would be like the fifth time I've moved my blog. I have a hard enough time keeping readers to begin with.

Although, I must admit, Blogger and MySpace seem to both conspire against letting me stay signed in no matter how many times I hit the damn "Keep my Signed in" button.

FYI: "Krista" is in fact NOT a strange name I call myself when I speak in the third person (I'm weird, but not that weird), but rather a good friend of mine who often acts as my conscience and reins me in when I start to act stupid. Or she tries to anyway, often with mixed sucsess.

Oh, and this is my 50th post, can you believe it? Here's hoping for a bit more regular schedule for the next 50.

Tag

2007-03-18T12:53:00.000-07:00

Over on my MySpace blog I answered a survey type thing. I usually don't do them, but I did, and if you are interested in the strange behaviors that I have check it out.

And I still hate MySpace.

The Week in Review

2007-03-16T05:54:00.000-07:00

This has been a pretty good week for me:

Work was EASY! I've never worked in the field so much so easily. Two days in Aguanga, two in LA, and all four I was home by 3pm! It all evens out in the end, since I'll be working my ass off next week.
For whatever reason, I've woken up every day this week at 5:05am. No alarm, nothing. Just "Hey! I'm awake!" Kinda blows.
I caught up on my comic reading. Interesting stuff going down.
And the week will finish up with a D&D session and an official day to get drunk! Hoo-hah! Can't complain too much about that.

Well, have a Happy St. Patrick's Day everyone!

UPDATE: Bah! No D&D for me; it appears that the crapiness which next week is guaranteed to be begins early. Bah!

Pictures

2007-03-15T15:07:00.000-07:00

So I've been searching through my pictures trying to find good ones of myself to put on MySpace, and have come to much difficulty (must... resist... urge to... make D&D reference...). It turns out that my whole life I thought i was photogenic, and I was wrong. I look like CRAP in pictures. And worse when I've been drinking! It's not like I just look drunk, which I wouldn't necessarily mind, it's that I often look like I'm faking a smile, when I know I'm not!

MySpace continues to frustrate me, even indirectly. (must... resist... urge to... scream... Khan...)

So I suppose if anyone has coolio pictures of me, let me know. Which is to say, pictures that I look decent in.

Or, you know, if anyone wants to hang out with me and take new pictures, that would be cool too.

Adorableness

2007-03-14T18:53:00.000-07:00

I saw this commercial a few weeks ago. It is without question one of the most adorable commercails I have ever seen. If you don't say "Aww" when watching it, then you have no heart.

Seriously.

I think the last scene is what is really the clincher for me.

Nerd Sensory Overload

2007-03-14T05:43:00.000-07:00

In my life I think I've met one person who would appreciate what I am about to say nearly as much as I do. Ironically, he wasn't even really my friend...

The Avengers and The Transformers are having a crossover.

And it's going to be in continuity - for both series.

To paraphrase Xykon: I think I just had a nerdgasm.

Mr. Barclay

2007-03-13T19:07:00.000-07:00

No no, probably not the one you're thinking of.

While on my trek back east I also took the opportunity to read a book besides Mark Steyn's latest. This was a book by one William Barclay on the subject of The Lord's Prayer. Mr. Barclay has written a series of books which examine the New Testament, many common prayers and other religious-related items. I find the books to be very interesting as a lay person who doesn't know much beyond what basic Catechism teaches. Barclay takes each verse or story and delves into what the words are truly trying to say, often coming up with multiple answers. He looks at the Greek or Latin origins of different words, how different translations present words, and the impact that the differences makes. He also looks at the historical and cultural perspectives, showing why certain phrases, which we often take for granted, would have had a much more profound impact on the audiences of Jesus' time.

While the books certainly won't impress a true theologian, for those like me, who are just looking for a little deeper understanding of the faith, they can be extremely helpful, allowing us to ask questions about our lives that we may not have thought of. I highly reccomend the books to everyone. I've thus far read three: The Gospel of John; the Gospel of Luke and the aforementioned book on The Lord's Prayer. His books can be purchased here.

A Bookeeping Note: I (finally) fixed the link to Candace's Blog. So for those of you who kept wondering why the link was broken, no, I wasn't smiting Candace, I was just being lazy. Typical, I know. Anywhoo, it's fixed now.

America Alone

2007-03-13T05:33:00.000-07:00

Ah, Mark Steyn, how I do love thee. For those who don't know, Steyn is a conservative columnist that specializes in humor. Think Jonah Goldberg, but smarter (not that Jonah isn't smart!). Anyway, he has a (kinda) new book out titled America Alone that looks at the changing demographics of Europe (and Japan) and discusses the implications of those changes in regard to the War on Terror, and western civilization more generally.

The basic thesis is this: The Secularized West is having fewer and fewer kids and a greater number of deeply religious Muslim immigrants. Within a few decades many western European countries will have a majority of Muslims living in them; this will have disastrous effects upon the West as a whole.

The sheer demographics are frightening and impossible to deny. Fertility rates have dropped massively in Europe (and to a lesser degree in the US) and the only reason population hasn't dropped in those countries yet is because of large immigration. Imagine: France without the French! While that might sound nice in theory, when the French are being replaced with poor, uneducated, pre-Enlightenment Muslims, problems can arise. In this scenario, the Danish Cartoon controversy and the French riots two years ago were just the opening shots in a cultural war which dwarfs anything we've seen thus far.

Why is it that Muslim immigrants can cause such problems? Primarily because the West has embraced the philosophy of multiculturalism, where no ideology is too radical to condemn. Thus, imams are free to preach hatred to their worshippers, radicalizing a large segment of the population. This, combines with the lack of a strong economy encourages fanaticism.

It is a very interesting book, and I highly recommend it to anyone (like me) interested in this sort of thing. Steyn argues that the West is voluntarily killing itself, and wonders whether we have the will to correct this. He's skeptical. Me too, though I guess one shouldn't give up hope.

As Rattrap always says: "We're all gonna die."

MySpace, Revisited

2007-03-09T20:49:00.000-08:00

You know what I hate? I mean, what really irritates the crap out of me? When I email or ask someone(s) for their opinions, and they ignore me. Come on people, when I ask a question, ANSWER ME!

So, by the excessively high vote count of 2-1, I've chosen to keep my MySpace account. What I am going to do with it (once I figure out how the damn thing works; some people make it look easy, and I really don't know if I care enough to reall learn) is to use the blog to post what I update. What will I update? Mostly random shit, a few pictures and differing music. I like a bit of a wierd mix, so I'm going to be changing the song posted on my MySpace page fairly regularly, and talking about the songs I post.

Of course, naturally, as I decide to do this I find out that loading songs on your MySpace page is a pain in the ass...

*Sigh* Nothing's ever simple these days.

Oh, and for you astute viewers: Yes, I did read "America Alone" by Mark Steyn. Yes, it kicks all kinds of ass, and everyone should be rightly horrified about the implications discussed in the book, and yes, I'm going to discuss it at greater lengths right on this blog, but no, not now. Now, I have to go Google damn HTML language so I can get pictures of my Heroes onto god-awful MySpace.

Return from Far, Far Away

2007-03-08T19:48:00.000-08:00

Soooo....

I made it back from the East Coast in one piece. But just barely. The woman I sat next to on my final plane flight was so annoying I tried to decide if I could bust open the window just to escape her G0d-awful annoying laugh. Two nights later it still haunts me...

But Durham was great fun. I forget how much I enjoy spending time with The Reva. I was also going to say I relived my college days of drinking games, but then remembered that I didn't play drinking games in college. Ah well. So let me instead say that I played Beer Pong and Flip Cup. Though I greatly enjoyed the former, I was much better suited for the latter. I also got to see a UNC basketball star get his nose broken on TV. Heh. Blood spattering can be so cool sometimes.

I watched a lot of TV while I was away, as I always do on these trips, and this time got to enjoy watching Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Well, I almost enjoyed Jedi, until it got to the end, and they showed that stupid-ass Anakin kid from the prequels standing next to Obi-Wan and Yoda. I spent the next half hour cursing George Lucas all over again. I also watched quite a bit of CSI, including a two-parter directed by Quentin Tarantino. It had some typical Tarantino scenes, but was damn good. I would go into more detail, but that would involve talking about ants, and the last thing I want Candace to do is freak out about ants and go into a berzerker frenzy trying to eliminate all the ants that she thinks she sees. I've probably already said too much. Anyway, good episode.

Though I have more to say, about a book I bought, news and events, MySpace and Civil War (Candace, you'll be sad), my body is still on Eastern Time so I will instead finish my Perroni (Birra Superiore) and sign off.

Excelsior!