So my weekend is once more upon me, which means that once again I’ve survived a harrowing three days of work and am now free to do whatever I want until early Friday morning.
Pity there’s not much of anything I want to do.
Last night brought me the major highlight of my life, another excellent episode of “Dead Like Me.” I’m glad it was so good, as it has to last me for a week.
The secondary highlight, a new episode of “Aqua Teen Hunger Force,” was only so-so, at best. It had definite moments, but overall, meh.
I did enjoy the latest episode of “The Venture Bros.”
“The Venture Bros.” is Cartoon Network’s latest original program. It sort of lovingly (bearing in mind that “love” can often be very twisted) parodies adventure series of various genres and media (cartoons, movies, comic books), though its most obvious inspiration is the old “Jonny Quest” cartoon.
The show is pretty twisted (but damned funny), and frequently causes my jaw to drop in disbelief.
The show is about two brothers, Dean and Hank Venture, their father Dr. Venture, and Dr. Venture’s bodyguard, Brock Samson, whose voice is provided by Patrick Warburton (of “Seinfeld,” the short-lived “The Tick” live-action series, “Family Guy,” and all sorts of movies in which he essentially plays the same character he played on “Seinfeld.”).
Dean and Hank are these sort of clueless losers who see the possibility for adventure around every corner, and are oblivious to most of the subtext of what’s going on around them, such as their father’s vaguely homoerotic attraction to Brock.
One of my favorite moments finds Hank and Dean looking to recruit Brock’s assistance in dealing with a “Space Phantom” (long story), and, upon finding him in his quarters having sex with a woman, who, upon Brock’s request, is wearing a space helmet (this all takes place on a space station) to cover up her ugliness, assume that Brock is currently engaged in a struggle with said Phantom.
The boys watch through the window, cheering Brock on and admiring his prowess in battle, as Brock wrestles the Phantom to the floor.
Then one of them asks, “Uhh…why is he doing that to the Phantom with his, umm…?”
The other responds, “Well…he needs both hands free, and he doesn’t have any other weapon available, so…”
It’s another show that’s not for everyone, but if you enjoy really twisted humor that provides a skewed view of conventional adventure stories, and you aren’t easily offended, I’d say to check it out. New episodes air on Saturdays at 11:00 pm, and the previous Saturday’s episode is repeated Sunday night at 12:30.
Anyway, that’s it for the TV review.
This past weekend was mostly uneventful, at least after Friday.
Friday was made eventful thanks to the remnants of Hurricane Ivan, which brought all kinds of nasty weather to the area.
Several tornadoes hit the area, some coming very close to where I live. The really bad weather pretty much waited until our shift was over and we had to drive home to hit the area.
I made it home to find that while the shopping center across the street still had power, my apartment complex did not.
That was hardly surprising, though, since one thing I’ve noticed about this area is that a sneeze can knock the power out. I’ve seen more than a few bright, sunny, windless days on which the power has just inexplicably cut out for several hours.
So the fact that it went out during a tornado wasn’t exactly a shock.
It was irritating, though, as I had no idea when it would be restored, and, having to get up at around 4 am the next day, I had no intention of sitting up in the dark waiting for it.
The issue of ensuring that I’d wake up in time was a bit of a problem, though, as I don’t own any sort of wind-up or battery powered alarm clock, and I couldn’t remember how to set the alarm on my cell phone (and I had no real desire to try to dig it out by candle light).
I decided to call work and ask the overnight crew to give me a wake-up call, but the weather had apparently done a number on the Sprint Network, as my cell phone kept telling me “Network Busy. Try to connect again later.”
Finally I remembered that, for a change, I had kept the instructions for my watch handy rather than throwing them out, so I set the alarm on my watch, set it by my bed, and drifted off to a fitful night’s sleep.
My sleep was fitful because I had no faith in my watch waking me up (even though the inadvertent setting of my alarm had done it once before, and at that time the watch was much further away from me), and I was concerned that if the power didn’t come back on soon everything in my refrigerator would have to be thrown out.
At around 10:30 the floor lamp in my bedroom, which I had turned to the on position before going to bed just for this purpose, came on, waking me, and heralding the return of my electricity.
I set my alarm clock, but kept my watch’s alarm turned on as a back up, then managed to fall more fully asleep.
Ultimately all of my concerns about alarms were unfounded, as I woke up on my own about three minutes before my alarm was due to go off.
Once Friday was out of the way, though, the remaining days were pretty much uneventful.
Today has been as well.
At 7:25 am this morning, like every Monday (and Wednesday) morning, the garbage truck arrived to empty the two dumpsters near my building.
For whatever reason, this relatively simple procedure takes around 10 minutes, as, once the dumpster is in place on the lift, they like to shake it several times to ensure they get every last drop of refuse.
So from 7:25 to 7:35 I get to hear the beeps as they back themselves into position several times, the sounds of the hydraulics hard at work, and the banging of the lid against the dumpster as they shake it like a British au pair shaking a crying baby.
After this is over I usually find myself making a decision as to my next move.
Will I get up, check my e-mail and do a little surfing before throwing my contacts in and going for a walk, or do I just go back to sleep?
This morning I opted for the latter. I slept until around 8:55, finally opting to get up.
I decided not to take a walk, though, as is my prerogative on Mondays.
Obviously it’s my prerogative on any given day, but I feel a bit more justified on Mondays, since I just got through working out every morning for the past three days.
At 10:00 I made my usual Monday morning call to my mother, who was too busy to talk to me. She had company coming and was cleaning her house in preparation.
So, as it was a beautiful morning, with the sun shining and a nice, cool breeze, I decided that the best thing to do was go back to bed.
Some might view this as wasting a beautiful early autumn day, but I think that beautiful days like today are the best time for napping. Lying on my bed I was enjoying the contrasting sensations of the cool air moving over me as the warmth of the sun beat down upon me.
At 11:00, my mother called back, as she had finished her cleaning ahead of schedule.
Not long into the conversation she got a beep and told me that it was my sister Kristy, and that she’d talk to me later.
Eventually I decided that I should go out and pick up some groceries, and after I got home I decided that I would go for a walk.
That pretty much brings us up to date. Once I got home from my walk I split my time between writing this entry and baking more peanut butter cookies.
I’m sure that somewhere along the line I’ll get sick of peanut butter cookies, but it hasn’t happened so far.
The cookies are pretty much the extent of any creative activity I’ve engaged in today. No drawing, no writing.
Still no word on the story I sent.
I’m getting a little impatient, as I’m curious to find out whether “Weird Tales” sends out actual full-paged letters or just the smaller rejection slips.
I know, I should “think positive,” but positive thinking has never paid off for me in the past, so it’s difficult for me to believe that it ever will.
It’s not that I don’t have confidence in the quality of the story. I tend to judge my own work pretty harshly, so it means something when I say that I think this story is a decent one, even if I did write it.
The problem is that I just have difficulty believing that something THAT good could happen to me.
Still, we’ll see, I guess.
In any case, I should probably try to do something creative.
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