Everything is Unfinished

Well yesterday had its ups and downs, but it was a good birthday nonetheless. Johnny came to take me to lunch at the yummy Mexican restaurant near my work, and brought me presents too! He got me the new Bad Religion album, which was very successful in waking me up this morning on the way to work, and Super Mario Bros. 3 for my Gameboy, which is why I needed to be woken up this morning. I got through all of world 1 and 4 levels on world 2 before the batteries died. I still can’t beat stupid level 2-4. I even remember it giving me problems years ago when I first played the game. And he got me a Strawberry Shortcake card that had these cute little punch-outs in it. They’re keeping me company at work now:

After lunch I finally got to work on a proposal that I had to send out, and it took waaaaay more time than I thought it was going to. Since my boss is usually travelling, I normally put the proposals together and send them out, but I practically wrote this one. I was so pissed by the time I was done, at my boss for not doing the work he should have and for myself for putting it off so long. And then I barely made it to the Fed Ex office before they closed - they locked the door behind me. But then Johnny and I went to the Pickerington Violet Festival, which we almost didn’t find because the signs pointed us in the wrong direction, and had a birthday funnel cake, some mini birthday donuts, and birthday cheese fries. The festival was pretty underwhelming actually, and I didn’t even buy a violet because we didn’t have enough cash on us. But it was so nice out last night, and we had a pretty good time. Next festival though, we’re bringing more money so we can spend some time in the beer tent!

I also got to order another present yesterday: a new iPod! Yay! Unfortunately the color rumors turned out to be untrue (the purple, orange and yellow ones will likely be new MINI colors) so I got one of the new model, 20 gig white ones. It will be here Monday morning! I got the free engraving special and found a particularly philisophical quote to put on it. I’ll put a picture up when I get it. This was made possible thanks to Johnny’s parents. I still have a hard time thinking of them as my “in-laws”, maybe because I actually like them! Thanks as well to Rinnert, for getting me a good deal. And since I couldn’t have a color one, I’m going to decorate it myself when I get it. Not quite as glamorous as these cell phones, but along the same lines. A guy I work with has also found some skins to customize your iPod, so I’ll take a look at those too. New toys!

Currently Stuck In Head: Bad Religion, Kyoto Now!

I’ve known Woody a long time. For about 20 years, actually. And you don’t know someone for that long without some of their interests rubbing off on you. So it stands to reason that I would have heard Peter David’s name a few times. Peter is a writer of comics and novels, and Woody is a big fan of his. Such a big fan that he’s actually *read* a lot of Peter’s stuff, not just listened to it on cd! Anyway, ever since Wood started his blog and linked to Peter’s, I’ve been reading it about once a week. I’ve never read any of Peter’s work, but I like the way he interacts with his fans in a setting like his blog, he’s funny and intelligent and a total left-winger to boot. And I just found out he’s left-handed.

I happened over to Peter’s blog today and was pleasantly surprised to see that he’d been tattooed at the San Diego Comic Con. He did it for a $1000 donation to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, “a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of First Amendment rights for members of the comics community.” I can get behind that, and I support tattoos (I have 2 myself), and Woody can feel good about himself for helping me find out how cool Peter David is. I may just pick up some of his comics next time I need my fix of Y: The Last Man.

Currently Stuck In Head: Unknown

The Bourne Supremacy
On the DVD for The Bourne Identity, Matt Damon said that the cast and crew of the movie only wanted to make another movie if they could do it as well or better than the first. Since The Bourne Identity was a great movie, they had some big shoes to fill. But fill them they did: The Bourne Supremacy was just as fun and action-packed as its predecessor. Matt Damon was once again superb as the action hero no one thought he could be, Brian Cox and Joan Allen were amazing as usual in their supporting roles and Éomer Karl Urban played a very nice “strong and silent” Russian Secret Service agent. I almost called him the bad guy, but he’s not, really. He just happens to be working for a politician that’s bad. The only thing I could have done without is what Zandra commented about on Johnny’s blog, the handheld camera work. I know what the director was trying to go for, but there were a few times when I thought I was going to fall out of my chair because I was dizzy. So I guess the effect hit its mark: when the director was told that some people in test audiences had actually thrown up because of the vertigo, he replied “Cool!” So The Bourne Supremacy gets two thumbs up. The theatre we saw it in, which Johnny commented about, gets half a thumb. Despite the cheap price, we endured a toddler making toddler-noises, a high-schooler getting escorted out by the cops, a LOUD cell phone right in front of us, no stadium seating, and the every surface in the bathroom was greasy. I’ve never appreciated the Lennox more.

I, Robot
I’m a fan of sci-fi, but have never read any of Isaac Asimov’s work. Nonetheless, I know enough about him to know that I, Robot wasn’t going to be even close to the story whence its name comes. Despite knowing this, I enjoyed the movie. I went into it not worrying about poor Asimov spinning in his grave and looked at it as a futuristic action movie, a la Minority Report, and I got exactly that. The special effects were outstanding, I was impressed with how they used most of the real Chicago in with the “new”, and although Will Smith played pretty much the same role he always does, he does it well by this point and at least he didn’t cut a song for the soundtrack. There were some little things that bothered me, of course, most of all that there is no way we’ll be that advanced in just 30 years. The tunnels alone would take us at least 50 - look at the Big Dig in Boston! And if we can’t even get used to hybrid cars, we’re certainly not going to embrace electric ones that drive themselves. If the movie was set a bit farther out, or even not given a date, I would have bought it. But then there were the BIG things that bothered me, namely Audi, JVC and fucking Converse. Audi wasn’t too bad. JVC was a bit worse, with the loving shots of the stereo but at least it played a part in the movie. But what the hell, Converse?! First of all, why would he want 30-year-old shoes when the rubber was probably rotted away? Second of all, it would have at least made a bit more sense if “retro aughts” was really big, but no one else seemed to need old stuff - the captain even scoffed at the shoes. Yes ok Will had the “old school” stereo, but that was a piece of technology. Maybe if you would have shown the new voice activated sneakers, I could have bought the need for low-tech ones. But I think the thing that bothers me most is this: Chuck Taylor Converse Hi-Tops came out in 1946, and have looked pretty much like they do now since 1962. That’s 42 years. Why would anyone think that they’d be different in another 30? He could have bought new ones, with non-rotten rubber, and probably a lot cheaper! But then Converse wouldn’t have gotten to have Will Smith spewing about their shoes. Anyway, I give I, Robot 3 stars out of 5. It would have gotten 4 if not for Converse, seriously.

Napoleon Dynamite
Before this movie came out, I read a blurb about it saying that it was the story of a 14-year-old boy who wants to grow up to be a champion milk judge. Nothing could be further from the truth. This movie was about an indeterminately-aged high school boy just living his life, trying to make friends, and being angsty in his own small-town way. Johnny quoted me on his blog, but I’ll say it again: this is the second-best movie about nothing I’ve ever seen. And it’s definitely the most real movie I’ve ever seen. The characters don’t evolve, or go through any life-changing events, they just are who they are and that’s enough. That Napoleon is hilarious is unintentional, and really just comes from him being a spazzy kid than from him trying to be a class clown. The more I think about the movie, the more I realize that it’s a very uplifting one. In the end, everyone finds what they want/need, no one gets hurt, and it’s very sweet. And to think they did it with a PG rating. That’s damn near unthinkable these days! Even this blog entry would be rated PG-13, because I said “fuck” up there. Whoops, now it’s R. Anyway, I give this movie a solid A, right on the border of A+. Everyone should go see it, and prepare to laugh a lot and leave the theatre vaguely satisfied.

Currently Stuck In Head: Leslie Bricusse, Talk to the Animals (from Dr. Dolittle)

I like to cook. I know that many people who know me probably don’t believe that, but I really do. It’s just that cooking is like anything else: I have to motivate myself to do it, but once I do I’m satisfied with the result, and it’s not as big of a hassle as I thought it would be. So the other night I decided to make an angel food cake. Actually, I decided to make this cake back in June, after I picked strawberries with my friend Carrie. But then a bunch of the berries went bad and I had to freeze them, and I just kind of pushed the cake idea to the back of my head. I’m well aware that I could have gone to the store and bought a perfectly good angel food cake, but I wanted to make it with Splenda, which is quite possibly the best thing science has ever invented. So anyway, the other day I was running out of freezer space, so I took the strawberries out and figured I’d finally do something with them.

When I got the ingredients for the cake, I figured I’d save myself some hassle and, instead of buying eggs that I’d have to separate myself, I’d just get cartons of egg white. Brilliant idea, except for one major problem: they didn’t stiffen. I don’t know if they’d been in the fridge too long (it was still several days before the sell-by date though) or if I did something wrong or if that’s just what happens with that kind of egg white. I figured I’d try to bake it anyway and see how it came out, but since it was so liquidy the batter just leaked out the bottom of my tube pan. Fortunately I had put a cookie sheet under the pan first, so I didn’t make too much of a mess. But I also didn’t have any cake. Guess I need some real eggs.

Seeing as plan A had failed, and I still had strawberries to do something with, I set out to make ice cream. We got an ice cream maker as a wedding shower gift and although we haven’t used it very often, it’s really cool. The bowl has water trapped in it, so you freeze the whole thing before making the ice cream, which means no need for rock salt. And no hand-cranking either! I had the ingredients on hand to make some nice low-fat frozen yogurt, and then I remembered that when I took the strawberries out of the freezer to make room I also took the ice cream bowl out! I’ve had the stupid thing in there taking up space since we moved in last October, unused, and I take it out the day before I finally decide to use it. Oh well, no ice cream that night I guess! So I put the bowl in the freezer and got my strawberries ready. I will hopefully get it made tomorrow. It’s going to be the best ice cream ever!

Currently Stuck In Head: They Might Be Giants, Bastard Wants To Hit Me

So Woody’s been watching some fan films at Superhero Hype. Fan films are kind of like fan fiction but a whole lot more expensive and time-consuming, and seemingly a lot less sex. There were a few films he liked, and he mentioned them on his blog, but I wanted to make sure you all went and watched this amazing piece of cinema, Grayson. It’s a “trailer” for a movie (which will, unfortunately, likely never exist) about Batman’s sidekick, Robin, who comes out of retirement to avenge Batman’s death. A bit of inside info, for those of you not in the know: Robin’s alter ego is Dick Grayson, hence the name of the film. I will warn you, the download took 10 minutes even on my cable modem, but it’s well worth the wait. After watching it last night, I found out that the two guys who made it actually do work in the film industry. Their company is called Untamed Cinema and they write, produce, direct, shoot, edit storyboard and compose for independent films. Let’s hope some studio sees their work and gets the ball rolling to make this movie.

I just finished the third compilation of Y: The Last Man, One Small Step. I’m not sure what issues this compilation contains, but main storyline involved the three astronauts coming back to Earth. Since I don’t want to ruin the story for anyone who hasn’t read it, I’ll make use of the extended entry feature for the first time to talk about possible spoilers.
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It would be really helpful if your body could store sleep. That way, when you had the time, you could sleep a lot and then feed off that reservoir of energy when you needed/wanted to be awake longer. That would have been particularly useful to me today. Monday night, I fell asleep at 8pm and slept all the way through till morning, when I got up at 7am. That’s at least 4 extra hours of sleep than I needed to function well yesterday! So of course last night I didn’t go to bed until almost 2am, and this morning I’m tired. If I had that extra 4 hours of sleep saved, I could have used a few. Instead I had to resort to playing spider solitaire and eating popcorn, which I burnt, to keep me awake at work. Actually, the smell of the burnt popcorn was enough to wake everyone in the office up, so I guess I did us all a favor.

Last week, They Might Be Giants released their 10th studio album, The Spine. I got a sneak preview of a few of the songs when we saw them on July 2, and the local good radio station has been playing the single, Prevenge. Unlike some of their more recent records, I liked this one immediately. At first I thought it sounded a lot like very early TMBG, with the absurd lyrics and strange instrumentation used on some tracks, but upon further listening I think it most reminds me of John Henry. Some great lines are “Sleeping is a gateway drug that leads to being awake” and my favorite, “Ghandi said ‘With my full house, I will blow your mind.’” I sometimes question the weird tangents that John and John tend to go on, musically, but then they come out with a wonderfully crafted album like The Spine and I remember why they’re hands down my favorite band ever.

So my birthday is next week. I tell you this not to solicit presents or even good tidings but because I have to come up with a wish list. I’d really like a few more games for my Gameboy, specifically Super Mario Brothers 3 and the PacMan collection. But then I wonder if I’d play them. I have Tetris, Zelda and the original Super Mario Brothers now, and all I ever play is Tetris. It’s gotten so that I see Tetris pieces in my mind when I close my eyes now, but I can’t stop playing! I’m neglecting my other games - I haven’t even beaten SMB and although I downloaded a map for Zelda I haven’t even used it yet. I think maybe I’ll just have to start playing more video games. Yep, it’ll be tough, but I think I can do it.

Speaking of my birthday, I am so looking forward to my new purple iPod! And they just lowered the price of the regular ones - 20gig is now $299 and 40gig is $399. They have the new click wheel like the iPod mini does and everything. So even though those are apparently the only sizes available now (other than the mini), the 20gig is definitely in my price range. The color ones better not be more expensive, or I may have to bust some heads. I hope they’re available in stores by Labor Day. I could get one for my trip to Chicago! Or maybe I’ll find out where there’s an Apple store in Chicago and get it there. Now my only dilemma is what to get engraved on it, if free engraving is still available? My name, and possibly email address, for identification obviously. But the second line should have something pithy and obscure. Maybe a TMBG lyric? I’ll have to think about it. Mmm, purple iPod….

Currently Stuck In Head: They Might Be Giants, Thunderbird

For a few months now, I’ve been going back and forth about whether or not to get an MP3 player. Do I really need one? Sure, it would be nice not to have to mess with cds in the car, but is it worth the money to have one? I could use it with headphones on trips. But do I travel that much? The bottom line was, I wanted one simply because I wanted one, but I couldn’t really justify the purchase. The other problem I was having was which one to get? Johnny and Kris have Nomads and like them, but I don’t like the scroll wheel on the side. (Although it looks like they have a new interface - check it out) I found a cool one from Archos that even has a sound recorder and picture viewer in it, but I wasn’t sure about the way files are displayed on the screen. I really wanted an iPod mini because not only do I love the iPod scroll wheel, they come in cool colors too! But I didn’t want to spend $250 for 4gb of space when I could get 20gb for the same price from another company. So I’ve waited, thinking I’d see what was available when my birthday came around. The birthday’s coming up soon, so the timing was perfect for me to see this:

Oh hell yeah! The one drawback to the iPod mini (besides only having 4gb) was that it wasn’t available in purple. But now we are very likely to see a purple iPod that could have up to 60gb of storage!!! This article that Johnny so wonderfully pointed out to me speculates that these will be available at the end of August. I think that the fates are practically ORDERING me to get one, and who am I to deny the fates? I’m eyeing the 15gb model at this point.

Speaking of eyeing things, here’s some Orlando. I think this will be the last picture of him I post - certainly not because I’ve run out of pictures, or because I don’t want to see pictures of him anymore, but simply because I’m lazy and don’t want to keep looking for new pics. Of course, I still reserve the right to post new images I find whenever I want to, and you can browse my archives if you need a quick fix. But for today:

Currently Stuck In Head: Aerosmith, Amazing

I got all of our pictures from the Chihuly exhibit sorted and up online. Go take a look if you’re interested. The link is over to the left, called Chihuly at the Conservatory. I’m glad we got there before it was over - it was a really cool exhibit, the pictures turned out really well, and I love glass sculptures.

We were supposed to go camping this weekend, a whole group of us. Unfortunately, our plans fell through earlier this week when half of the people had to cancel so tomorrow we’re going to see Anchorman then have a cookout and play Halo at our place. I’m actually kind of glad, since I’ve had a sore throat since last Sunday. I guess it’s not going to go away on its own, and I should probably go to the doctor. I hate being on antibiotics though. I’ve taken them so much over the years that I’m actually immune to amoxicillin, which is the only thing you could ever get from the Student Health Center on my college campus. I think they even prescribed it for broken bones. Oh well, maybe it’ll be better tomorrow. Some sleep will help too.

But first…

Currently Stuck In Head: Annie Lennox, Into The West

Yes that’s right: even though it’s been over a month, I’m finishing my account of our Memorial Weekend trip to Canada. Why bother, you ask? First of all, for my own records - the trip is still pretty fresh in my mind, but if I don’t write this stuff down soon I’ll forget it. Secondly, when I scrap this trip I’ll be able to print out these entries and use them on the pages pretty much as-is. And third, I did actually have someone ask if I was going to finish blogging about the trip. Hope you’re reading this! You can see the pictures that go along with this adventure by clicking on the link over to the left. The one that says O Canada Weekend Trip. The first two days of the trip can be read here and here. And now, on with the show…

After getting some much-needed sleep, we were ready to face a day full of Torontonian goodness. It’s a good thing we got up and around at a decent hour, because the power went out in our hotel just as we were getting ready to leave. We gladly fled its tiny confines and headed downtown. Our first stop of the day was the CN Tower, the world’s tallest building. We had about an hour before the baseball game started, so since there was a 30-minute wait to get to the top of the tower we decided not to do any of the “extras” like eat at the revolving restaurant (named 360, of course) or go up into the Sky Pod, which is an even higher observation deck than the one the cheap ticket gets you to. I’m not sure what it is about towers like this that capture peoples’ fascination. Once you get to the top, the view is pretty much the same anywhere: buildings, streets, usually some water in the form of a lake. But every city I visit that offers such an experience, I do it: Seattle, Vancouver, Chicago (twofold). And I enjoy it every time.

One unique thing about the CN Tower is that below the regular observation deck, there’s a deck with a glass floor. It’s not particularly scenic looking straight down, but it was really cool to see just how high up you were. There were a lot of people who refused to walk on the glass, which was pretty funny considering we found out later that the whole deck has a glass bottom, but most of it is covered up with carpet.

Once we had satisfied our need to be 1,136 feet in the air, we went next door to the Sky Dome to see the Blue Jays take on the Rangers. We were two of the lucky fans to get free Mr. Sub duffel bags, which went to the first 10,000 people. I’m not sure if they managed to give them all away - the reported attendance was 22,225 but there weren’t nearly that many people there. Some fans did bring a drum though, and chanted all sorts of inspirational things. It was just like in Major League. And then there was the “highlight” of the game, which came at the 7th inning stretch when William Hung sang Take Me Out To The Ballgame. Unfortunately, his out-of-tune rendition allowed the Rangers to best the Jays, winning 4-2.

After the game we meandered our way down to the waterfront. Along the way we passed a park with a cool sculpture. Also in the park were some very tan, very buff, very gay men with an overwhelming amount of coconut-scented tanning oil on. I could smell it from 20 feet away! I suppose I could have used it at the game, but instead I ended up with a neon red face when my sunburn from the day before got even more sunburned.

When we made it down to the lake, we walked along the water for a while. It was a beautiful day and there were a lot of people out. We even saw a guy in a Columbus Blue Jackets shirt and a guy in a Toledo Mud Hens jersey. Someday I hope to live in a place that has a nice waterfront like that, and if I ever get to I will make sure to enjoy it as much as I can. We enjoyed even more of the lake by taking a boat tour of the Toronto Islands. It took about an hour and we got an amazing view of the skyline. Our tour guide told us a story about a movie that was shot on the islands that was supposed to be set in the Florida Everglades. They did a really good job making it believable, but then forgot to digitally erase the CN Tower from the background. Oops.

The tour ended just in time for us to catch a cab and head to Second City. We got there early enough to have a drink and look at all the pictures of previous casts on the walls. It’s amazing how many brilliantly funny people have come out of Second City - John Candy, Eugene Levy, Bill Murray, Martin Short, Gilda Radnor, Catherine O’Hara, Bob Odenkirk - the list goes on and on. Maybe in the future one of the people we saw will make it big and we’ll be able to say we saw them when they were just starting out. As we were waiting for the show to start, in troops this group of about 50 high school kids with some chaperones. The show we saw, Canadian Idle, was really funny and the kids all seemed to like it but it certainly wasn’t anything less than an R rating. I think the performers were unnerved by them, because after the show they came back out to do some improv. The chaperones told the high schoolers they couldn’t stay because they had to get to their hotel, and when the cast came back out on stage they said something about how they wouldn’t feel so bad swearing now that the kids were gone. Between the show and the improv we saw another guy in a Blue Jackets shirt. We said hi to him and his wife, who were also in town for the long weekend. Small world.

During the show, we had a few drinks and by the time it was over, we were slightly tipsy and very hungry. There is a restaurant in the theatre, but it was a bit pricey so we checked out the place across the street - Wayne Gretzky’s. I didn’t even know he had a restaurant! There is a huge mural on the side of the building, but the menu wasn’t all that great so we didn’t eat there. I’m not sure what we expected to find that was open at 11pm on a Sunday night, but we started back toward the subway, thinking we’d find some food along the way. The only place we found was The Peel Pub, but unfortunately they were BLARING very bad rap so we didn’t stay any longer than it took to take the picture. We kept walking, through the Entertainment District, and I realized I hadn’t even looked up what musicals were in town. I would have liked to have seen Hairspray, which we saw big signs for. Maybe next time!

Finally we get to the subway, and go back to our stop. We wait for the streetcar and take it about halfway back to the hotel. We had noticed this bar the day before, and wanted to stop at it even if it was only to get a picture of the sign. Tipsy McStaggers was the name of the bar that wanted to buy the Flaming Moe recipe on an episode of The Simpsons so we couldn’t pass it up! We did end up having a drink, but their kitchen was closed so we still needed some dinner. We finally got back to our hotel after midnight and ordered a pizza from Pizza Pizza, which is actually not affiliated with Little Caesars. The pizza was really good, but I was surprised they they didn’t seem to know what I was talking about when I asked for Canadian bacon! Maybe I just should have said bacon.

This September, Johnny and I will be taking two trips on consecutive weekends that will require us to fly. For Labor Day weekend we’ll be in Chicago, then the following weekend we’re going to New Orleans. Realistically we could drive to Chicago - it’s only 6 hours - but I’d have to make the trip there by myself, as Johnny will already be there, and it’s the most boring drive in the history of the universe. So I’m trying to find some good flights for us.

Personally, I love to fly, and the smaller the plane the better. Smaller planes fly closer to the ground, and I love to watch the teeny little cars drive, and try to identify interstates, and see how many people have pools. One of my lifelong dreams is to go up in a hot air balloon, which I do believe Woody did last night. I hope to see some mention of it on his blog today, hint hint. But anyway, I’ve never been too nervous in a plane, although there have been times of rough turbulence that make me a bit queasy. So yeah, flying really doesn’t bother me. It’s airports that I hate. For one thing, I am not the kind of person who likes to get somewhere early only to sit around and wait. I much prefer to get places at the last possible minute so I don’t have to entertain myself. Also, it’s always a toss-up whether you’ll be in an airport that actually has anything in the way of entertainment - I’m surprised at the number of terminals I’ve been in with only one or even no restaurants/gift shops, and I’m even more surprised at how early said places close. And of course we all know about the hassles of getting through security now. Granted, it’s much easier than it was 2 1/2 years ago, but there’s still the chance that your belt has just a little bit too much metal on it, or you were randomly selected by the airline to have your bag hand-checked, and it’s just a hassle. I won’t go into my further thoughts about this subject to avoid any possible visits from the FBI or having my name put on a no-fly list.

Anyway, back to the trips. This will be my fifth trip to Chicago, a city that I absolutely love. We of course did all the touristy stuff on our first trip, like going up the Sears Tower and the Hancock Center, going to Navy Pier, and taking a boat tour of the lake and river. I’d like to go back to Navy Pier this trip, and maybe even do the boat tour again. Since it will be Labor Day I’m sure there will be something going on for us to do.

The reason for the New Orleans trip is twofold. First of all, Gary goes to school down there, and we haven’t seen him since the wedding. Secondly, the Seahawks are playing the Saints on the 12th, so we used the two reasons as an excuse. It’s one of those places that I’d like to be able to say I’ve been to, even if I have no real desire to party there during Mardi Gras. I’m looking for some historical and architectural tours to go on, because even though the city is somewhat of a shit hole, it used to be beautiful and I’m looking forward to seeing that side of it. I’m also fascinated with the graveyards, where everyone is buried above ground because of the water table. It’s not bad luck to take pictures of graves, is it?

Here’s something definitely not bad luck to take pictures of:

Currently Stuck In Head: Nirvana, You Know You’re Right