Wow! It's Bullet Sunday again! I was talking to a friend this afternoon when she remarked that she's going to give up on reading blogs because so many of them have nothing but stupid crap on them. At first I was offended, because my blog is nothing but stupid crap, but she then told me that of all the stupid crap she reads, mine is her favorite. I still don't know if that was a compliment or not.
On to the stupid crap...
• Repeat. I've started re-watching the first season of Veronica Mars for the hundredth time and think that I appreciate it now more than ever. The first episode is positively mind-blowing in the way that they set up so many seemingly-random events that won't pay-off until the very end of the season. There are lots of shows I've liked over the years which have been canceled, but none of them left such massive future potential laying in the dirt than Veronica Mars. If only there was a way to erase my memories of the show form my head so I can watch it all over again for the first time. It's things like this that make amnesia not sound like such a bad thing, and perhaps I should investigate running my car into a tree. Hey, it always works in the movies.
• Repeat. Every time I read a new piece of news about Zac Snyder's adaptation of one of the greatest comic book series of all time, Alan Moore & Dave Gibbon's Watchmen, it makes me want to read it all over again. So, over the course of the last twelve nights, I did. Like Veronica Mars, I'm astounded at how carefully the foreshadowing of future events was crafted on almost every single page of the story. Unlike so many comics today where you could rip out a dozen pages and not really affect anything, losing even a single page of Watchmen would be catastrophic to the structure of the story. Oh how I wish Alan Moore would tackle another project like this again. Comics needs it so badly.
• Repeat. While working at night, I like to toss in a movie for background noise so I won't be distracted by other noises going on around my home. This usually works quite well, because I always choose a movie that I've already seen a dozen times so I won't be tempted to stop work and watch it. But there are some movies that you are compelled to watch no matter how many times you've seen it... Sneakers is just such a film. I'm amazed that it holds up as well today as it did when it was released. At first I thought it was because the technology they used was so cutting edge at the time they filmed it, but now I'm thinking it's because the brilliant performances are so timeless. Needless to say, I'm pretty pissed at everybody involved with Sneakers because I lost 2 hours and 6 minutes of time I should have been working.
• Repeat. Just when I think winter is finally over, I get hit with stupid-ass snow first thing this morning. Followed by rain. Followed by hail. Now it's just ball-shriveling cold. Where in the hell is my Spring? It's almost MAY. I'm dying here.
• Repeat. Heaven help me, my Fifth Annual Kick-Ass Blogiversary Celebration starts tomorrow. As always, it will start out with a Blogography wrap-up followed by four contests over the following four days until everything ends on Saturday and winners are drawn on Sunday. Two things I had wanted to do for the event didn't get done, one thing I am still unsure about, and one thing I think is totally insane... even for me... so it should be an interesting week.
Until tomorrow...
Good news, everybody! Those toxic Bac-Os I ate yesterday didn't kill me! To celebrate my new-found lease on life, I present another Bullet Sunday...
• Blogiversary. Blargh. It's one week until I have to get things ready for my Fifth Annual Blogiversary Celebration, and I am nowhere near ready. Six months ago I started two very cool projects specifically for the occasion... but one is not ready and the other fell through and has to be re-worked. This is great news for Blogiversary Six, but a real inconvenience for Blogiversary Five. Oh well. There's plenty of big fun in store, as usual. Mark your calenders...
• Nads. How big of balls do you have to possess in order to write an email to a complete stranger asking if they have any shirtless photos they'd be willing to share? My guess is that these balls would have to be at least two pounds each. So when I received just such an email this morning, all I could think about was how does somebody finds pants to fit over such enormous testicles? In any event, anything I'm willing to share is already on my blog or posted to my Flickr account. There ain't no more. But thanks so much for being crass enough to ask.
• Imported. I purchased a nifty audio/video importer for my Mac so I can transfer all my favorite old television shows from videotape to my iPhone. The XLR8 XtraView unit works pretty well considering the source material is of really poor quality. Oh how happy I will be to finally eliminated the last vestiges of analog media in my life.
• Cliffhanger. But there is a down-side to digitizing all these fantastic old shows... so many of them end with a cliffhanger that was never resolved. I get to that last episode, then get angry all over again that television networks screw over their viewers by not wrapping up all the loose ends of the story. Then, just when I'm over being pissed off because the shows were cancelled, I get enraged all over again because they haven't been released on DVD and I'm having to digitize them off of crappy videotape in the first place. Even if studios don't want to go to the expense of manufacturing the DVDs, they could at least put them up for sale on iTunes or something. This would cost them practically nothing AND be a nice source of revenue for them. Here are the top five shows I want released...
• Taxed. I finished most of my taxes months ago, but needed a few final bits of information before I could send them in. On Monday, I'll hopefully get the last piece of the puzzle so I can squeak in under the April 15th deadline. Oh how I hate the US tax system. It's a bloated bitch of a complicated mess, and I remain in a constant state of shock that our citizens don't revolt against the government for not coming up with something that's not fucking stupid. While I don't think that the Flat Tax Initiative or the Fair Tax Initiative are anywhere near perfect, at least they are something that normal people can understand, so I say go for it. Nothing could be worse than what we have now. It's at time like this that I think government officials need to be taken into the street and beaten severely for their complete and total failure to serve us with any competency.
And on that happy note, I suppose I should get back to work.
Where did my vacation go? A week is much too short.
I need another vacation.
• Radio. Assuming I make it back home over the mountain passes in one piece, I will be a guest host on Hilly's Snackie Radio tonight at 3:00pm (Pacific), 6:00pm (Eastern). I guess that would be midnight Oslo time, which is where my head is still at, so hopefully I won't fall asleep on the air...
• Poverty. I took a quick look at my credit card statement online. As hideously expensive as I thought the trip was, it actually ended up being much worse. Bring on the peanut butter sandwiches for a month! Eh, but it was a treat for my birthday and I had fun, so what can you do?
• Flight. Have I mentioned how much sweet it is to have a media entertainment center for those long-ass flights? Well it is. The time just flies (heh heh) by when you've got something to do. I watched Elizabeth: The Golden Age (excellent, with an amazing performance by Cate Blanchett), Michael Clayton (okay, but a little Erin Brockovich to me), Eastern Promises (good, though a little inappropriate to be watching in mixed company with the nudity and violence), Enter The Dragon (awesome! haven't seen it in a decade), Bee Movie (suck-ass BORING, I fast-forwarded through it), and and episode of The Office (always good).
• Customs. When you come back from an international trip, you have to claim your luggage for possible inspection whether you are continuing on a connecting flight or not. This doesn't really bother me, but the third degree you get from the customs officers while you wait for your luggage does. I was interviewed twice. The second time was no big deal, but the first time was ridiculous. Not only did he want to know stuff that was none of his fucking business (what does my work matter when I just told you I was traveling on vacation?), but I didn't get the impression he was even listening to my answers. Some questions were duplicates, and others were asked as I was still speaking. I fail to see the point. Do they expect that random questioning is going to cause somebody to slip up and admit they're hauling contraband?
How long were you out of the country? Six days.
Why were you in Norway? On vacation to visit a friend.
Why did you go Sweden then? To visit another fr--
What do you do for work? I'm a graphic desi--
How long were you out of the country? Since Sunday... isn't that six da--
Are you bringing back any food items? Just some candies.
And why were you in Norway? Vaca--
Bringing back any agricultural products? Just some marijuana I picked up in Amsterdam.
AH HAAAAAHHH! D'oh!
&bull Parking. Usually, I just park at the airport because it's really convenient to have your car waiting for you when you get back. But I found a coupon for "MasterPark" so I gave it a try. It's cheaper than the airport, they valet park your car, their shuttles run constantly, and if you call ahead they'll have your car waiting for you when the shuttle arrives. Sweet! Except I went over my one week coupon rate by 5 hours and had to pay an entire extra day for the overage. That kind of sucks, but I don't know that I can give up this kind of pampering now that I've experienced it.
Well, it's 8:00am... I suppose I should get out of bed and try to get my life back to normal. It's always rough trying to adjust to reality after vacation... even if it was only a week.
You want a bullet? Here's a bullet for you...
• VACATION, BITCHES!!!
Away I go...
And if you celebrate the whole Easter thing (or just like chocolate bunnies), I hope your holiday is a happy one.
Another Bullet Sunday is upon us, but I'm not ready for the weekend to be over!
• Organizational... This past week Suzy asked me if I still had a souvenir I bought from when we were goofing around in L.A. back in September. I knew I hadn't thrown it away, but couldn't find it. Probably because whenever I get back from a trip, I toss all my souvenirs and crap into one of ten big cardboard boxes I've got piled on top of my shelving units. Disgusted with my lack of organization, I decided to sit down with one box a week until I've organized all my travel stuff. It's hard work, but every once in a while I see something from my past that makes me smile, and that makes it all worthwhile...
I wonder how many people know you could once smoke on a plane?
• Time Capsule... Cannot express in mere words how happy I am with my new Apple Time Capsule. Using the built-in wireless connection, it took 22 hours to back up the 142 GB on my laptop. That was a bit harsh, but the incremental updates every hour are very fast. It's constant, unobtrusive, transparent backup that works beautifully. I've lost count of the times that Time Machine has saved my ass both at work and at home. Just one of the hundreds of reasons I'm such an Apple whore.
• Album... 2008 promises to be a very good year for the 80's music that I love. It has been rumored since January that Depeche Mode would start work on their new album this month for release in November (with a tour hopefully following in early 2009). Morten Harket (of a-ha fame) is releasing an English-language album this month in Norway, which will hopefully be available when I'm there next week. The Pet Shop Boys are meeting with producers this month for their upcoming album. Bananarama is gathering material for their next album. Erasure is also rumored to be working on a new pop album very soon now. I have high hopes that New Order will get together this year. Still no word on a Thompson Twins reunion, but I remain optimistic that one day it will happen.
• WWZ... Many thanks to Vahid and Dustin for a brilliant recommendation... World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War. Totally awesome book! Now I want the audiobook, because Dustin says the recording has Henry Rollins in it and totally kicks ass! They have it at iTunes, but it costs $18.95! I think I'll see if the library has it to borrow first...
Because me loves the zombies...
And popcorn. Can't have zombies without popcorn!
Speaking of zombies... it's time for me to get back to work.
Bullet Sunday already? Where did that weekend go?
• Radio. Today at 4:00pm Pacific (7:00pm Eastern) I will be a guest host on BlogTalk Radio for the incomparable Mr. Fab's Pointless Drivel LIVE show! Heaven only knows what we'll talk about, but it's sure to be a lot of fun! To listen in, just point your web browser here and you're good to go! Once the show begins you'll be able to view a live chat with other listeners but, to join-in the chat yourself, you'll need to pre-register for an account (it's free!). Please note that the show is usually NSFW and probably not appropriate for children, small animals, The Radical Christian Right, or those not possessing a sense of humor...
• Talk. While I'm talking up the big fun that's BlogTalk Radio, I would be remiss to mention that half the blogosphere has radio shows there on Sunday. It starts off with Karl from Secondhand Triptophan at 2:00pm (that's Pacific Time), followed by Hilly-Sue from Snackie's World at 3:00pm, Fab at 4:00pm, Turnbaby from And The World Turns at 5:00pm, and Kyra from The Kyra Sutra at 6:00pm! Quite a line-up! Usually Sundays are travel days for me and I miss the shows, then have to listen to the archives. But today I'm excited because I'll be able to listen to everybody LIVE! Though I have to say that I'm feeling a bit left out that I don't have a radio show of my own. Maybe I'll just beg everybody to guest-star on their show and it will be almost the same? Probably not, but I guess I'll find out.
• Misrepresented. While State Legislator Sally Kern (Oklahoma House of Representatives) was making disgusting homophobic remarks to a small group of people, somebody recorded her dumbass ramblings and posted them on the internets. Now the stupid bitch is having to deal with the fallout of being a "representative" who is very selective about which of her constituates she "represents" (gays need not apply!). After listening to her bullshit, I came away with a sense that she doth protest too much. What is she compensating for I wondered? And then it hit me... she's not afraid of the "gay agenda" she's afraid of being exposed! A classic case of denial...
• Lesbionic. I suppose I shouldn't be too hard on Representative Kern... but I'm lashing out from fear. Fear that she and her homophobic nut-job comrades might actually be able to make good on their Nazi-esque fantasies of cleansing the nation of homosexuals. A nightmare! WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO LESBIAN PORN?!? Because right now I'm trying to decide which video I need most, and that's a struggle I'm not wanting to give up...
I'm leaning towards "The Trouble with Girls" because it sounds naughty! But then I see "Girls Do It Best: Volume 2" and think perhaps that's the way to go... obviously these babes are really good at making lesbian porn if they've got a SEQUEL going on! Except further down the shelf there's "Girls on Girls: VOLUME FOUR" yes, VOLUME FOUR, which sounds great, yet I can't help but wonder if they're just running the series into the ground like the Star Wars prequels did? But then... THEN... I spot "Bitch Banging Bitch" and think this video must be the one to beat... it's got bitches in it! And they appear to be experienced bitches, unlike the amateurs to be found in "Bitches in Training." And there's always "100% Strap-On," which could be interesting and educational... or just very, very scary. What's a boy to do? Well, if people like Sally Kern get their way, there won't be anything TO do. The lesbian porn industry will be shut down. THIS is AMERICA?!? Nay, I say! Hmmm... I wonder where Obama stands on lesbian porn?
• Trek I have been really enjoying the new remastered versions of Star Trek lately. It's amazing how a fresh batch of special effects can totally refresh the show. It's just as relevant today as it ever was, and looks absolutely beautiful. ..
More gorgeous images can be found here, and where you can watch the remastered episodes can be found here. If all else fails, and you're wanting to know what the fuss is about, you can always buy episodes from the iTunes Music Store.
And that's a wrap for Bullet Sunday! Be sure to tune in to Pointless Drivel LIVE on BlogTalk Radio today at 4:00pm Pacific Time (or 3:00pm if you haven't set your clock ahead yet). Your life might just depend on it!
Well, maybe not yours, but definitely mine. I hear Fabby sends out assassins to kill you if his ratings drop when you guest-host.
It's Bullet Sunday and I'm shooting blanks! My brain is so tired that I can only think of three points this week...
• Salmoni! When I got home from Portland, Animal Planet TV was running a 2003 special I hadn't seen before called Living with Tigers. Tigers have always been one of my favorite animals, and this documentary about the efforts to save them from extinction was fascinating. It follows two cubs, Ron & Julie, as they are raised in captivity and eventually trained to be released into the wild. The hope is that the dwindling tiger population can be bolstered in this manner before wild tigers disappear altogether.
But almost as interesting as the tigers, is one of the trainers who was working with them: Dave Salmoni. The bastard is just insane. He keeps saying things like "let's hope she doesn't realize that she's much bigger and stronger than I am so I don't get killed" as he walks up to a growling tiger to take her food away. And every time you see him, his clothes have holes all over from when he's been wrestling with the big cats. After Living With Tigers was over, they showed another program which had Salmoni working with Grizzly Bears (Predator vs. Prey)... and then aired previews of another where he was with lions (Into The Lion's Den). You can tell he has a passion for his work, but I have to wonder how long it will be before I'm reading that he's been killed by stampeding elephants (or whatever). Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin's tragic death is still very fresh in my mind, and something tells me it's only a matter of time. There's only so long you can keep exposing yourself to high-risk scenarios with dangerous animals like this before your number is up...
• Mappable! As a long-time lover of maps, I was delighted to stumble upon Transit Maps of The World while browsing at Powell's City of Books yesterday. This wondrous tome has maps of every rapid-transit system on earth... which is kind of like cartographic porn for people like me. The graphics are really too small to be functional, with the diagrams being treated more like works of art than actual maps (and they are!)...
This is very cool book for anybody interested in maps or rapid transit, and you can read more about it at Amazon. If you'd rather not spend the money, you can always take a look at the free transit maps online courtesy of Urban Rail.
• Majesty! No matter how many times I fly over The Cascades, I'm always amazed at how beautiful they are. The day I stop being awed by sights like this, it's time for me to stop traveling...
And now I'm off to bed, where I hope to lapse into a coma for seven hours or so...
UPDATE: Aaaaaaannnnnnd my blog seems to be refusing to accept my entry. Guess I'll give it a try in the morning and hope that the problem solves itself rather than requiring me to do any actual work.
It's Oscar Sunday! Which would probably be a lot more exciting for me if I actually gave a crap about the Oscars. Oh well. I got my taxes done, AND it's Steve Jobs' birthday today, so that's pretty exciting.
• Portlandia... I am working in Portland, Oregon later this week, and am staying an extra day to goof around the city. If anybody in the area wants to meet for dinner on Saturday, just let me know!
• Oscars... Of the movies I've seen in 2007, my favorites (in order) are... Juno, 300, Waitress, Hot Fuzz, Curse of the Golden Flower, Paprika, The Man From Earth, Ratatouille, The Bourne Ultimatum, Once, Music & Lyrics, and Blades of Glory. I have not yet seen Michael Clayton, Lives of Others, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Persepolis, and Hannah Montana: Best of Both Worlds, but expect they will make the list as well...
• Boyfriend... The latest meme crawling through the blogosphere is "Who Is My TV Boyfriend?" Since I love television, I was compelled to try it...
What the bloody heck? I can't STAND that whiny bitch Chuck Bartowski! I am very close to erasing Chuck off my TiVo's Season Pass list, because I am so sick of his bumbling idiocy. Why oh why couldn't I have gotten kick-ass Jack Bauer from 24 or Eli from Eli Stone? Jonny Lee Miller is ever so dreamy! Click here to find out who is YOUR ideal TV boyfriend. I couldn't find a "who is your ideal TV girlfriend, but I already know it would be the sweet hotness of Veronica Mars herself, Kristen Bell (who is now on Gossip Girl and Heroes, but will always be Veronica to me).
• Gelatinous... I was dismayed and disgusted to find out that the Hello Kitty Gummies I was raving about two days ago have yucky GELATIN in them. Gross! Shame on Kellogg's for putting that vile crap in their product when there are far better alternatives available (like citrus pectin). And shame on Sanrio for allowing Hello Kitty's reputation to suffer by licensing her to a company that would put dead animal cartilage in her gummies! This sucks ass.
• Ilusional... Found this sweet tutorial for an optical illusion which makes a black & white photo turn into a color photo (may not work in a feed-reader, you'll have to click through to see it). Just stare at the dot for 30 seconds, then mouse over the image without taking your eyes off that dot (it may help to put the mouse pointer next to the image so you can do the mouseover without having to look!). After you've seen the color photo, look away for ten seconds, then come back and look again...
Hah! It's black & white! Sweet! That's a photo I took of Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany.
• Iron... I'm mainly a "DC Comics guy" because I'm into Batman and such, but there's one super-hero at Marvel of which I'm a major fan: Iron Man. I've been following the Iron Man movie updates over at Geeks of Doom with growing interest (Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark is genius casting!), and now see that somebody has new poster art and a description of the movie trailer from WonderCon. It sounds as through director Jon Favreau has totally nailed it, and I am really looking forward to the debut on May 2nd. Given my huge disappointment in the X-Men film franchise, it will be nice to have a good comic-to-movie flick from Marvel this time...
And there's another Bullet Sunday down the tubes. Time to wash clothes so I have something to wear to work in the morning.
Where did my weekend go?
Yeah, yeah, yeah... I know it's actually Monday... but it's a holiday Monday, which means it's almost like a Sunday. Kind of.
• Hoff... Managed to watch the new Knight Rider made-for-TV-movie last night. As one of my favorite shows from the 80's, I was both nervous and excited to see how they were going to handle the material. What they got right was not starting over from scratch, but instead making this show a continuation of the original series. I also enjoyed the cast, the cameo by David Hasselhoff, the new and improved abilities of K.I.T.T., and the overall storyline. What they got wrong... very, very, very wrong... was the voice of the car. The original K.I.T.T. (masterfully voiced by William Daniels) was a sarcastic bastard, who let his self-perceived superiority complex drip off of every word. Val Kilmer as the new K.I.T.T. just sounded bored. In all fairness, this might not be his fault... the guy is a talented actor who is probably just reading his lines as directed... but it really killed the show for me. Why the fuck didn't they just bring back Daniels? Oh well. The entire show was just a giant Ford commercial with Ford commercials inside the Ford commercials... so maybe product placement and ad revenue was what the showrunners really cared about...
• XP... I've run across more than a couple grassroots movements attempting to save Windows XP from being dropped by Microsoft. Given how badly XP's successor, Windows Vista, COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY SUCKS ASS... I am 100% behind this effort. XP may not be pretty, but at least it actually works for those times I need a Windows machine. Here's hoping that Microsoft bothers to listen.
• Heaven... While my friend Perry and I were mucking about in Poland a couple weeks ago, we took a taxi driven by an 80-year-old driver who didn't speak much English. As he was barreling down the streets of Warsaw, a song came blasting on the radio that sounded familiar, but neither Perry or I could place it. Thinking I could look it up later, I jotted down some of the lyrics in my iPhone and promptly forgot about it. Eventually I happened upon my notes and Googled to discover that the song was "(Feels Like) Heaven" by Fiction Factory. Not finding anything on the iTunes Music Store (FOR SHAME!) I downloaded some tracks off BitTorrent and liked what I heard. This led me to order their CD, Throw The Warped Wheel Out, which finally arrived today. Oh how I love rediscovering great 80's music from my past! Just when I think there's no more to be found, something like this happens...
• Terminated. Despite myself, I am completely addicted to "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles." The quality of the show on almost every level has been surpassing my expectations more and more with each new episode. The abject despair of the future-humans under domination of SkyNet is almost painful to watch... just as it should be. The clever dance the writers are weaving around the continuity of the first two films is really impressive, and I can't wait to see where they take the story next...
• Chicken... Today on the drive back home over the mountains, I stopped off for tacos and did my usual bit of requesting that the beef be replaced with rice. This caused the guy taking my order to ask if this was because I was concerned about the massive meat recall out of California. When I told him no, that I make the substitution because I am a vegetarian, he said that he was thinking of becoming a vegetarian too. The only problem was that he thought he'd get tired of eating chicken all the time. I was going to ask him exactly what kind of vegetable a chicken was, but ultimately decided against it. Maybe he'll get it all figured out when we get an outbreak of Mad Chicken Disease.
And there's my Bullet Sunday on Monday. I hope my brain can shut down tonight so I can get some real sleep. I'm entirely too tired of being tired to keep going without it.
Can you believe it was only a week ago that I was Bullet Sunday-ing with a hangover I got the previous night in Germany? I can't. Time seems to be getting away from me. Or my brain has been destroyed by alcohol.
• Licorice. I haven't eaten much licorice since Jenny unintentionally destroyed my taste for it by exposing me to the atrocity known as "Dutch Double Salt Licorice" while we were watching Pirates of the Caribbean 2. I had commented at the time that the Dutch are ingenious for managing to come up with something that tastes saltier than actual salt. Sometimes in the middle of the night I still wake up screaming because I have flashbacks to the agonizing burning of licorice gone terribly wrong. A year later, and I now learn that a friend of mine has a business importing Australian licorice to Europe. Once I get to his booth at the Germany candy show, he fills a bag full of samples and hands me a lifetime supply of licorice treats.
Which I have almost entirely devoured in just a week's time. This stuff is so fantastically delicious that the only word which comes to mind in describing it is "orgasmic"...
The licorice is yummy soft, but magically doesn't moosh together into a big sticky clump in the bag. The taste is bold, but tempered with just enough sweetness to keep it from being bitter. I am so addicted to the stuff that I may have to start smoking crack in order to wean myself off of it. While it's made in Australia, Black Opal is actually an American company, so I'm hoping I can buy it locally. If not, I see that Licorice International is importing it, so my dream of banishing the memory of Dutch Double Salt Licorice may finally become a reality.
• Microhoo. My opinion? Microsoft + Yahoo! ≠ Google. Save your money.
• Struck. Unless something totally unexpected happens, the Hollywood writer's strike should be over on Tuesday. Good deal? Yes. Great deal? Not really. I maintain that the writers deserve much more than they got, but that's negotiations for you. Of course, I'd be a lot happier for the writers if they hadn't made side-deals which allowed some writers to return to work while everybody else was on the picket line. Oh well... hopefully new television will be coming back soon, and that's what's really important.
• Paula. Yesterday as I was looking for a paperclip that had skittered under the refrigerator, my iPhone rings...
DAVE: "Hello?"
ROBERT: "DUDE! DID YOU RECORD THE SUPERBOWL?!?"
DAVE: "Errr... no."
ROBERT: "Aw, man! Super Deluxe Girlfriend erased mine."
DAVE: "Well, if it helps any, I hear that the Giants won."
ROBERT: "I don't care about the game, I wanted the half-time show."
DAVE: "Ah. Who was it this year?"
ROBERT: "Paula Abdul."
DAVE: "Uhhh... seriously?"
ROBERT: "Yeah, I like that song she did there."
DAVE: "Well, it would be pretty stupid to put a song out for the Superbowl and not release it. Have you checked with iTunes?"
ROBERT: "No."
At which point he hung up on me. But he called back five minutes later...
DAVE: "Hey, did they have it?"
ROBERT: "Yeah," he says dejectedly, followed by dead silence.
DAVE: "Is something wrong?"
ROBERT: "Without the crowd screaming and all the dancing to distract you, the song's not that good. Paula sounds like a robot singing into a bucket."
DAVE: "Oh. Sorry about that."
ROBERT: "That's okay. It's not your fault you ruined my life.
It would be nice to have a normal conversation with Bad Robert just once.
• Aid. One of the sheer joys left in flying (once you ignore the cramped seats, late departures, lost luggage, and your idiotic fellow passengers) is the SkyMall catalog you get on every flight. I have never purchased anything from it, but boy do I love to look. Half of the stuff is genius, half of it is crap, but all of it is interesting. My favorite item this time around is the "Stealth Secret Sound Amplifier"...
"If a conventional hearing aid sounds like an embarrassment to you, try the Stealth Secret Sound Amplifier. It looks just like a cell phone ear adapter and works as a sound enhancer so you can join conversations and even hear soft voices from 50 feet away. Now you can enjoy the best of both worlds: a more youthful appearance and better hearing."
Hey! It's working! You totally look more youthful...
No. No, I lie. You so totally look like a dick...
Bah! It's 7:00 and I really should take a minute to eat something. A Black Bean Chipotle Burger is calling me...
Gee... what to do with a four hour layover in New Jersey? Guess it must be time for Bullet Sunday!
• Recovery. I will admit to not feeling my best this morning after my drunken exploits yesterday. My head is fine, but my stomach feels as if it could take revenge at any moment... leaping out my throat and strangling me with my esophagus. I'm blaming the corn pizza. Or maybe the guy sitting across from me this morning at the Köln-Bonn Airport picking his nose. And not just a quick flick to remove a stray booger either... this classy bastard was really digging in there. I was increasingly concerned that he would hit brain and lobotomize himself. And when I say "concerned" I actually mean "hopeful." Talk about a stomach-turning sight.
• Approval. Disapproving Man turned out to be more popular than I am on my own blog, so I thought I'd tell the whole story. My hotel is just off a roundabout (or "rotary" to those of you reading in the US Northeast), which means the crosswalk I use several times a day is recessed. So when I cross it, I'm not crossing to a corner, but directly into a hair salon's advertising board with Disapproving Man on it...
This means I pass that evil bitch with his condescending smirk both coming (where he watches me the entire way I'm crossing the street) and going...
I wonder if the poor bastard realized he'd be abused like this when he was asked to model for professionally disheveled hair? I'm guessing no...
• MottoSchal. I am so totally wearing my scarf from the Kölner Karneval right now, and am quite the sexy bitch! Everybody is totally noticing my hotness as they walk by, and I owe it all to Emma.
• Revision. Well, they're either admiring my hotness or wondering why a grown man is wearing a clown scarf... it's hard to tell. I'm banking on the former, because the raw sexiness of my scarf-wearing self is too much for even me to take. This morning I had to finally had remove it while brushing my teeth (YES! I SLEPT IN IT!!) because I was getting myself all excited just looking at me. I think between my Kölner Karneval scarf and my Batman Chuck Taylor sneakers, I'm pretty much going to be an unstoppable man-whore with the ladies from here on out.
• Revision Revision. See, I told you I wasn't feeling well.
• Россия. As I added Warsaw to my Travel Map, I longingly looked over at Moscow and started wondering how difficult it is to get a tourist visa. Russian history absolutely fascinates me, and visiting Moscow and St. Petersburg would be a dream come true. From talking to people who have been there, the word that keeps popping up is "expensive." Apparently the hotels are among the most pricey in the world, and even a simple 5-day Russian tour can cost thousands of dollars. Still, when I go to Flickr and do a search for "Moscow" and see the stunning images that pop up (like the magnificent shot of St. Basil's Cathedral by Ferenc Koltai below), I really, really want to go. Guess I better start saving my pennies rubles...
• Beastly. Just for fun, I sometimes go to my blog stats and click on a few of the sites linking to me so I can see what's happening there. The first one I clicked to was a blog called "Bête de Jour" which caught my attention because I knew that "bête" is French for "beast." Once I got there I saw that the author links to me in their blogroll, titled "People who blog better than me." My first reaction was to think "that's probably true"... not because my ego is so huge (though evidence dictates otherwise)... but because so many of the random blogs I come across are total crap.
Then I started reading it. And could not stop.
By the time I got to the entry entitled "Air Rage," I realized that the very idea of me blogging better than this guy is positively laughable. I'm simply not this clever or smart. La Bête just started writing in December, so click here to read from the beginning and then click on the "Newer Post" links hidden at the bottom of each entry to keep going. You're welcome!
And that's a wrap! I'd add more bullets, but some lovely ladies across the airport are admiring my scarf, so I think it's only fair that I go share a taste of Dave with them.
Or find out that they're making fun of me so I can go to the bathroom and cry. One of those two things.
Bee-boo-bee-bloop-blarp!
This entry probably won't make much sense. I spent the day at the world's largest candy show, and consumed so much sugar that my brain hurts. And I think I'm going blind. My hands are kind of shaking too. Perhaps I'm on my way to a sugar-induced coma or something?
What a way to spend a Bullet Sunday!
• Candy! Oh, alright... I kind of promised myself that I wouldn't blog about the candy show because I've done that before (here's 2005 and here's 2007), but just two things...
It's Hannah Montana, bitches!! I so totally want one of those mini star purse tins!
"Billy, do you want a lolly? Okay then, pull one out of the FREAKISHLY FRIGHTENING VAMPIRE HEAD!!"
• Milk! Well, maybe three things... Coolest product at the show this year? BAM! It's Quick Milk! This product is a straw with flavor beads in it. When you suck milk through it, your beverage magically changes flavor and color! TOTALLY AWESOME!! Though... is it just me, or does the product description sound vaguely sexual? "Stick into milk and feel the taste?" Wha-??
In any event, science prooves Quick Milk is good for you too!
• PEZ! Okay, four things... I have a small collection of PEZ candy dispensers that I've collected from around the world. When I mentioned this to the very nice lady working the PEZ booth, she very graciously gave me a bag filled with new PEZ dispensers, even though I'm not a corporate candy buyer! I didn't think it was possible for me to love PEZ more than I already do, but this was so awesome that now I am compelled to! The coolest I got were a Mozart PEZ head sold only in Austria(!), characters from an upcoming movie called "Kung-Fu Panda", and a Johnny Depp head from Pirates of the Caribbean 3! I also got to see prototypes they had on display for upcoming movie tie-in dispensers for Batman: The Dark Knight, Madagascar: Crate Escape, and Disney/Pixar's WALL-E.
I LOVE YOU PEZ!! You're my favorite dispensable candy!
My cool PEZ tote bag that I carry everywhere now!
• SEASONED! Tonight as I was buying yet another slice of street-vendor pizza for dinner, a guy behind me (about 45 years old and obviously American) asked me if I was an American. When I told him "yes" he kindly offered me some advice from a "seasoned traveler" (which is what he called himself)... "You need to get yourself a money belt, because if you keep your cash in your pocket like that, somebody might steal it and that would end your vacation real quick!" Now, having just watched EuroTrip where there's a gag involving a money belt, it took all my composure not to bust out laughing. He was trying to be nice, so I was doing my best to play along (even though, technically, I consider this to be bad advice, as it marks you as a tourist carrying a lot of cash)... "Oh, thanks for the tip! You've traveled a lot then?" I query. "Yep, this is my third time to Europe and I've been to Canada and Mexico, of course" he said with pride. "Ah. Have you been to Asia then?" I asked. "Ummm... no... just to Europe the three times now," he answered, putting extra emphasis on the "three times" part. I just stood there staring at him with this blank look on my face, wondering how somebody who has been out of the country only three times considers themselves to be a "seasoned traveler." Probably because he watches Rick Steves (rolling my eyes here) on television or something. Not really knowing what to say, I stupidly blurt out "Oh... well, good luck with that then!" and scurried off. I've lost track of the number of times I've been out of the country (over 40 probably?) and could likely call myself a "seasoned traveler," but I can't imagine handing out unsolicited advice on the street to people I don't know. He was trying to be helpful, so it's hard to fault him for a kindness, but I can't shake just how bizarre an incident this was.
• ADVICE! AAAAAAAAHH! Except I feel compelled to say that, given the abundance of cash machines everywhere, it's far better to carry small amounts of cash in your pocket or wallet than to use a money belt. This way, even if you are robbed, you don't lose everything. Even if you are in a country without cash machines and where they don't take traveler's checks, I'd still say it's smarter to divide your cash on your person... keeping a small amount in your pocket for minor purchases on the street, and the rest with your passport in your money belt (or whatever), so people don't see your stash.
• FAHRT! Picked up yet another photo for my "fahrt collection" (tee hee!)...
Though, I must say, this true fart from Sweden is still my favorite.
And that's my Bullet Sunday. Since it's almost midnight in Germany as I type this, and I'm not a bit tired because I've been eating sugar all day, I anticipate tomorrow to be slow-going.
Unless, of course, I start eating more sugar first thing to get myself going...
It's Bullet Sunday as I sit here watching the genius that is Invader Zim on DVD. I love GIR.
• Band. A while back Karl found a rather cool meme about making a band and album via random blog searches. I answered it over on his entry, but enough people have asked me about it that I'm reprinting it here. You get your band name from the first article title at a random Wikipedia search. The title of your album is the last four words of the last quote on the random quotations page. Your album cover comes from the third image on a random Flicker page. You then moosh everything together, and here's what I got...
Photo taken from Juan Farrell's Flickr
• Fuckabee. If this ass-wipe wins the presidency, we're all doomed. Of course, we're pretty much doomed right now. I guess I'm just really tired of doom.
• Traction. It started snowing pretty good this morning as I left for work. The snow was all powdery, so when it landed on our icy roads, traction became a problem. Having driven in these kind of conditions for decades, I just reduced my speed by half and anticipated my stops well in advance. Tricky, but not really a big deal. Until I turned the corner and saw one car being pulled out of a ditch, then went another block to see a police office lighting road flares because another car had run off a bridge. WTF? If you are not capable of driving in adverse conditions... STAY THE F#@% HOME!! Or buy my upcoming new book...
• Traveled. By some accounts, I've traveled quite a lot. My travel map shows visits from Asia to Europe and back again. This is especially true for US citizens, where over 80% of us don't have a passport. Which is why it's cool that today I got to meet somebody who's extensive travels make mine look positively tame. It was then that I realize that I've only been south of the equator once, have never visited South America or Australia, and have no "that's when the police confiscated my motorcycle and took my jar of peanut butter" stories. I really do need to get out more, because making the leap from "traveler" to "adventurer" sounds like a lot more fun than eating ice cream and watching cartoons. Well, maybe not a lot more fun... but at least a little more fun.
• Inked. Is there anything worse than printing something out, only to look over and see the error light blinking on your printer? Yes. Yes there is. That would be seeing that you've run out of ink, and have every color cartridge available except the one you just emptied. VENGEANCE WILL BE MINE INFERNAL PRINTING MACHINE!!! Hmmm... maybe I've been watching too much Invader Zim?
And now it's time to see if I can get some sleep so I can get up extra early for work. Heaven only knows how many dumbasses I'll have to navigate around if it snows again.
It's Bullet Sunday in Biloxi as I wait for my first of four flights today! Nothing quite so fun as flying from one small city to another small city.
• Feature. I had five hours to catch some sleep before I had to meet the 4:20am shuttle to the airport. Naturally, this means that some stupid bitch has to dial a wrong number and wake me up shortly after midnight. And, of course, I hang on to my phone because I just know the dumbass won't bother to check the number, but will instead dial it again... and she does ("YOU. HAVE. THE. WRONG. NUMBER!!!"). Why doesn't iPhone have a "FAVORITES ONLY" feature?? A way of setting it so anybody NOT on your "favorites" list will automatically be dumped to voicemail with NO notification played? And, since I'm fantasizing here, why can't you put it on a schedule? Make it so anybody calling after 10:00pm or before 8:00am (or whatever) who isn't on your favorites list will be told to go fuck themselves? That would be an astoundingly useful feature, and I don't know why some mobile phone manufacturer hasn't implemented it.
• Etiquette. Speaking of mobile phones...why don't people realize is extremely rude to use your phone on public transportation? My shuttle may have left at 4:20am, but some bad-mannered fucker in a pink shirt managed to find somebody to talk to for the entire 30-minute trip to the airport. People are trying to catch some rest here, asshole.
• Handicap. And speaking of assholes... why is it that people using the handicap parking never know how to park a fucking car? When I was at my Milwaukee hotel, some idiot parked angled across three spaces (only one of them handicapped)... WITH A SUBARU! OVERNIGHT!! And, of course, since parking lots are personal property, there's no way to ticket the offense. This just encourages the morons to get worse and worse. And don't give me the bullshit "there wasn't room to get out" excuse. If that's the case, then pull up and drop off your passenger before parking so you're not blocking a walkway. Being handicapped doesn't give you an excuse to be a dick...
So what if I block the walkway! I'm handicapped, so fuck you!
• Prize. I've been trying to devise unique prizes and events for my fifth blogiversary coming up in April. One of my ideas was to have a prize drawing for a Dave Event in the city of your choice... anywhere in the world with an airport served by a major airline carrier. I figured it would be not only exciting for anybody who entered, but VERY exciting for myself. Who knows where I'd end up? I mean, if somebody in Seattle won, that wouldn't be much of a trip... but what if it was somebody in Bucharest? Or São Paulo? Or Jakarta? How cool would that be? I mean, Davekarta may only be a party for two, but that would still be pretty sweet. And then I got to thinking about it. Who knows where I'd REALLY end up? Pyongyang? Baghdad? Darfur? SACRAMENTO?!?*** Hmmm... actually, I wouldn't mind visiting North Korea... but there are some places that I just don't know how I'd do it. I dunno. Maybe there could be some kind of pre-approval process when you enter, but that kind of spoils the fun, doesn't it?
• Approach. Hmmm... I was just looking through my photos and noticed how cool the approach is into the Gulfport/Biloxi Airport...
If you look really closely, you can see the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino!
On top of that, the airport here has FREE Wi-Fi internet and plays this totally awesome 80's soundtrack at full volume. Sitting here I've heard Thompson Twins, Devo, R.E.M., The Police, Talking Heads, The Fixx, Wang Chung, Billy Idol, Eurythmics, and Def Leppard! Sweet! It's almost worth coming to Biloxi just to use their kick-ass airport.
• MacWorld. Oh crap. MacWorld starts tomorrow. Since I didn't win a million dollars at the Hard Rock Casino Biloxi, I'm terrified at what Steve Jobs is going to unleash in his keynote. Undoubtedly something very expensive that I just can't live without (like a new $7000 Mac that fits up your ass and is controlled directly by your brain using radio waves). Sometimes being a Certified Mac Whore is not easy. Especially if you end up bankrupt. To tell the truth, I'd just be happy if Apple would fix iCal and Mail so that they were useable again. Between the HORRENDOUS FUCKING INTERFACE DESIGN CHANGES of iCal, and the CONSTANT CRASHING AND SLOW-SLOW-SLOW-SLOW START-UP TIMES for Mail that occurred with the OS X 10.5 Leopard release, I'm really starting to get pissed off. Apple is messing up bad, which is tragic when you consider they set the benchmark for this stuff in the first place.
And that's it for Bullet Sunday. I'll be traveling all day long and will probably head to bed the minute I get home, so I figured I might as well post it now.
*** Just kidding, Hilly. Juuuuust kidding.
Buuuuuuuuuullet Sunday! Buuuuuuuuuullet Sunday! Bullet Sunday! Bullet Sunday! Bullet Sunnnnnnnnnnnnnndaaaaaaaayy! Amen.
Driver. Remember the good old days when driving was a relatively effortless endeavor? When you could be assured that most of the people out on the road were semi-competant behind the wheel? Now-a-days I get the feeling that nobody else out there knows how the hell to drive. I spend every waking minute on the road having to watch out for all the crazy crap that other people do so I don't get in an accident. Just driving to the grocery store is now a massively stressful ordeal. It would be easy to put the blame on mobile phones... but I honestly think people are just getting stupider and stupider. Today I saw a pedestrian get nailed by a dumbass bitch who didn't bother to look right before making her turn. This is not complicated stuff... how hard is it to remember that you look left-right-left before pulling out into traffic? The guy bounced up and walked away... but what if he hadn't? When are people going to realize that a car can be a deadly weapon if you don't pay attention?
Flavorful. Mew left a comment in my Jellybean entry asking what my favorite jellybean flavors are. After much deliberation and taste-testing, I've finally come up with my top ten...
Yummy. Now I'm sad that I've eaten all my jellybeans. Except the coffee and licorice ones. Blech.
Worst. I've already laid the honor of BEST MOVIE OF THE YEAR on Juno. Now I have the extreme displeasure of awarding WORST MOVIE OF THE YEAR on Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. Sure there are probably movies that sucked more, but this horrible confusing mess of the film is by far the most disappointing. Talk about taking a can't-miss franchise and flushing it down the toilet. I'm happy that I never bothered to see it in theaters, but am really pissed that I just bought it on DVD. Stunning special effects do not a good movie make. I can't believe that Johnny Depp signed off on the script.
Winner. Well, if it's possible for a format to actually win the Hi-Def format war, I guess it's going to be Blu-Ray. Not that I'm surprised or anything. I've been reading articles like this saying so since almost the beginning. I still think that it doesn't much matter... whichever one comes out on top, digital delivery is the future. Blu-Ray (or whatever) is just a stop-gap. Still, I'm happy to have come out on top for once... I've still got the bitter taste of failure in my mouth from hopping on the mini-disc fiasco.
Terminated. Watched the sneak-preview of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and was not very impressed. As desperate as I am for new television during the writer's strike, I don't think this is it. About the only high point was getting to see Summer Glau again... but that just made me miss Firefly all the more. I'll undoubtedly watch it for a while to see how things go, but I don't have my hopes up. Fortunately, Series 2 of the excellent British show Torchwood is due to air here in the US on January 26th... now there's sci-fi television to get excited about.
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