So I finally decided to create a MySpace account.
It took a while, during which I felt like I was being rejected and that my one halting attempt at actually being social and trying to join in was doomed to failure while I waited for my log-in to actually start working.
It was funny, as just last week I was reading a column by John Dvorak about how people over 30 can’t understand and use MySpace.
For a minute there I wondered if he meant it literally and that the only reason Brian and Scott were able to get on was that, at 30, they hadn’t yet crossed the “over 30” threshold.
But eventually I got in. You can check it out (and become my friend) here.
Suddenly I’m a joiner. I feel dirty.
Friday, March 03, 2006
Thursday, March 02, 2006
You Also Don't Have To Wear Pants To Blog, So Think About THAT
Among many, many, many others, one of the main things I don’t understand about fundamentalist Christians is why they speak out against technologies or government and public polices that they feel are signs of the end times.
Sure, there’s a lot of pain and suffering in the Book of Revelations, but ultimately, for the fundamentalists, that particular book is the Bible’s happy ending.
The only people who are really going to suffer are the non-believers and the Johnny-come-lately believers; everyone else will have been whisked away in the Rapture.
It seems to me that, if you’re one of those who will be dropping trou as you ascend bodily to Heaven, you’d feel a certain smug satisfaction watching events on Earth unfold into the tribulations that the people who wouldn’t accept your Chick Tracts have to suffer through.
Seriously, if the Book of Revelations is, as many (yes, I know – but don’t care – that it’s not all) fundamentalists believe, a 100% accurate prediction of events still to occur, then we know that tings are all going to work out in the end, so why bother worrying about it? After all, it’s not as though there’s any chance that God is going to lose, is there?
So if you already know how it’s going to end, you know that your side is going to win, and that there are going to be clear signs that this all going to happen, why wouldn’t you be glad when you start seeing those signs?
Take this woman (You thought I was going to say “please” in the parentheses, didn’t you?) complaining about RFIDs because she equates them to the Mark of the Beast.
Shouldn’t she be cheering it on? Sure, it’s a tool of the enemy, but the enemy is going to lose anyway, so why not just get it over with?
The sensible approach would be to encourage people to get the Mark, as ultimately you’ll be fast-forwarding to the end and helping to thin the heathen herd.
Same with complaints about “One World” government, which was also predicted to be a part of the end times, yet is something that people like Pat Robertson rail against all the time. Again, signs of the looming Apocalypse really ought to be good news for true believers who otherwise seem so eager for the end to come about.
That’s the other thing I don’t get; the fundamentalists who complain about liberals and humanists and atheists (Oh my!) who “hate” America. Like fundamentalists don’t? They can’t do anything but find fault with the country, they claim that God Himself has a mad on for us, obviously a fundamentalist isn’t going to have much love for a country that gives its citizens license to think, say, and believe whatever they want, and as they sit waiting with bated breath for the Rapture (“Coming Soon” for the last two thousand years) it’s obvious that they can’t wait to blow this godless popsicle stand.
Personally, I can’t wait for them to disappear either. If it’ll mean getting rid of Pat Robertson, Dubya, and Fox News, the Rapture can’t come fast enough.
Today has been pretty uneventful. I got up, sat around, talked to my mom, went in to work for a meeting, came home, had lunch/dinner, and now here we are.
When I was getting my lunch ready earlier I realized that should put some music playing when I found myself singing Rocksteady (We bean to rock, steady/Steady rockin’ all night long) aloud.
The batch of Nick Cave songs that soon flowed forth from my computer’s speakers were vastly preferable to my off-key rendition of a crappy 80’s song.
I’m A Perfect Example Department:
Last night’s guest on The Colbert Report was liberal blogger Arianna Huffington of http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.
That she’s a liberal was news to me, as my recollections of her are as a really irritating conservative commentator – sort of a Rush Limbaugh in drag – on shows like Politically Incorrect and from various pieces of election year (1996) coverage on Comedy Central serving as a counterpoint to Al Franken.
Evidently Al rubbed off on her, though I can’t help but wonder how much “rubbing” went on given the flirtatious nature of their on-air “debates.”
She still bugs me, though, mostly because I’ve never been able to figure out why I should care what she thinks one way or the other, as I never knew (or cared to find out) who the hell she actually is and why anyone was ever listening to her in the first place.
In any case, on last night’s Report she was talking about the many advantages of blogging. Among them she listed the fact hat “you don’t have to be good-looking to blog.”
It’s a good thing, too, because what would you do without Threshold?
Of course, barring my having enough free time – and more importantly, motivation – to write some entries at work, you’ll get to find out over the next few days.
Sure, there’s a lot of pain and suffering in the Book of Revelations, but ultimately, for the fundamentalists, that particular book is the Bible’s happy ending.
The only people who are really going to suffer are the non-believers and the Johnny-come-lately believers; everyone else will have been whisked away in the Rapture.
It seems to me that, if you’re one of those who will be dropping trou as you ascend bodily to Heaven, you’d feel a certain smug satisfaction watching events on Earth unfold into the tribulations that the people who wouldn’t accept your Chick Tracts have to suffer through.
Seriously, if the Book of Revelations is, as many (yes, I know – but don’t care – that it’s not all) fundamentalists believe, a 100% accurate prediction of events still to occur, then we know that tings are all going to work out in the end, so why bother worrying about it? After all, it’s not as though there’s any chance that God is going to lose, is there?
So if you already know how it’s going to end, you know that your side is going to win, and that there are going to be clear signs that this all going to happen, why wouldn’t you be glad when you start seeing those signs?
Take this woman (You thought I was going to say “please” in the parentheses, didn’t you?) complaining about RFIDs because she equates them to the Mark of the Beast.
Shouldn’t she be cheering it on? Sure, it’s a tool of the enemy, but the enemy is going to lose anyway, so why not just get it over with?
The sensible approach would be to encourage people to get the Mark, as ultimately you’ll be fast-forwarding to the end and helping to thin the heathen herd.
Same with complaints about “One World” government, which was also predicted to be a part of the end times, yet is something that people like Pat Robertson rail against all the time. Again, signs of the looming Apocalypse really ought to be good news for true believers who otherwise seem so eager for the end to come about.
That’s the other thing I don’t get; the fundamentalists who complain about liberals and humanists and atheists (Oh my!) who “hate” America. Like fundamentalists don’t? They can’t do anything but find fault with the country, they claim that God Himself has a mad on for us, obviously a fundamentalist isn’t going to have much love for a country that gives its citizens license to think, say, and believe whatever they want, and as they sit waiting with bated breath for the Rapture (“Coming Soon” for the last two thousand years) it’s obvious that they can’t wait to blow this godless popsicle stand.
Personally, I can’t wait for them to disappear either. If it’ll mean getting rid of Pat Robertson, Dubya, and Fox News, the Rapture can’t come fast enough.
Today has been pretty uneventful. I got up, sat around, talked to my mom, went in to work for a meeting, came home, had lunch/dinner, and now here we are.
When I was getting my lunch ready earlier I realized that should put some music playing when I found myself singing Rocksteady (We bean to rock, steady/Steady rockin’ all night long) aloud.
The batch of Nick Cave songs that soon flowed forth from my computer’s speakers were vastly preferable to my off-key rendition of a crappy 80’s song.
I’m A Perfect Example Department:
Last night’s guest on The Colbert Report was liberal blogger Arianna Huffington of http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.
That she’s a liberal was news to me, as my recollections of her are as a really irritating conservative commentator – sort of a Rush Limbaugh in drag – on shows like Politically Incorrect and from various pieces of election year (1996) coverage on Comedy Central serving as a counterpoint to Al Franken.
Evidently Al rubbed off on her, though I can’t help but wonder how much “rubbing” went on given the flirtatious nature of their on-air “debates.”
She still bugs me, though, mostly because I’ve never been able to figure out why I should care what she thinks one way or the other, as I never knew (or cared to find out) who the hell she actually is and why anyone was ever listening to her in the first place.
In any case, on last night’s Report she was talking about the many advantages of blogging. Among them she listed the fact hat “you don’t have to be good-looking to blog.”
It’s a good thing, too, because what would you do without Threshold?
Of course, barring my having enough free time – and more importantly, motivation – to write some entries at work, you’ll get to find out over the next few days.
The Devil's Paper Towel Holder Or Building A Better Death Trap
Even though I got an earlier start today, having woken up before 8, I wasn’t nearly so productive as I had been on Tuesday.
I did go kind of crazy in the kitchen, though, making way more food than I needed for just me.
As a result, I opted to invite Brian and Kathleen over for dinner. They couldn’t make it, though, as Brian had duty and Kathleen had a Pilates class.
Or so they said.
It’s just as well that they didn’t come over – whether they honestly did have other engagements or not, the worthless liars – as nothing that I made really turned out well enough that I’d have wanted to share it with anyone.
Of the things I made today the one that turned out best was the loaf of Banana Bread, though the pasta dish I made to go along with the steaks and fried Polenta was okay, as was the marinara sauce I made for dipping the fried Polenta in.
The one thing I learned from my culinary experiments was that deep-frying is a pain in the ass and even hours later you still feel oily and gross.
Beyond cooking I really didn’t do much.
I opted to go for a walk sometime around 10, though I cut it kind of short as I was walking sans Nano, which made the walk kind of tedious.
The reason I was devoid of music was that the Nano’s battery will apparently drain if it’s not connected to a charger even though it’s not actually on.
The other major activity I engaged in was mounting the paper towel holder on the wall. This experience, coupled with my previous experiences, led me to the conclusion that this paper towel holder is evil incarnate. I can’t even put into words what a pain in the ass the thing is, nor can I explain just how much I hate it. The worst part is how deceptively perfect the thing is. I mean, it looks nice, the color matches my cabinets quite nicely, and it should be a simple, straightforward device, but it’s not. It’s the Devil’s Paper Towel holder.
Look upon the face of pure evil. Don't let it fool you the way it fooled me. This thing is absolute evil. Stephen King could probably write a best-selling horror novel about my paper towel holder. Something similar to Christine, only, you know, with a paper towel holder instead of a car. Hell, King could actually write it on paper towels and it would probably still be a best-seller.
Despite what people may think – and yes, I am aware of how often I have to start off sentences with that declaration – I’m really not a very morbid person.
Pessimistic? Sure. Negative? I guess.
But morbid? Not really.
For example, I don’t spend much time thinking about my own death. I have, however, previously come to the conclusion that, despite the heart attack that looms inevitably in my future, it will be some kind of stupid accident that does me in, the kind of thing that gets labeled as “death by misadventure.”
I’d concluded that it will almost certainly happen in the home and that I’ll be dead for days before anyone notices, but I was never really sure what, exactly, the fatal mishap will be. Certainly it will be the result of some kind of idiotic carelessness, like electrocuting myself trying to get a bagel out of the toaster with a butter knife or something equally retarded.
Today, however, I actually had a vision of how it will go down, though not when it will go down.
Basically, what will happen is this.
I’ll be in my bathroom – either the bathroom here, or in another place with a bathroom very much like the one here – and I’ll have occasion to try to tinker with something on the ceiling.
Rather than get a step ladder, I’ll opt to stand on the toilet. Because I’ll be in my stocking feet, I will slip on the slick porcelain. Flailing about wildly, I’ll grab onto the shower curtain rod, steadying myself briefly before applying too much force and yanking it free, causing myself to fall sideways and crack my skull open on the edge of my bathroom sink.
Unconscious, I’ll bleed out into the vinyl tile, my pleather shower curtain (I’m pretty sure that I will always have a faux leather shower curtain no matter where I’m living) serving as my death shroud.
Ideally this is quite some time down the line, but the point is that it’s easily plausible, especially considering that I actually have had occasion to stand on my toilet in to tinker with something on the ceiling (the exhaust fan).
So it’ll either be that or I’ll be in the kitchen and drop a fork on my foot and cut myself. The cut will become infected and I’ll be too lazy to see a doctor about it and I’ll die from the infection.
Or…
Well, there are just too many stupid ways for me to die, but I’m sure that one day I’ll find the one that’s just right for me.
And there is always a very good chance that I will be killed by my evil paper towel holder.
Okay, so maybe I am a little bit morbid, but I don’t devote a lot of time thinking about the various Rube Goldbergian ways in which the Universe might make use of my laziness, negligence, and clumsiness to take me out once and for all, though ever since Showtime canceled Dead Like Me I’ve been forced to come up with my own convoluted death scenes.
In any case, I think it’s time for me to visit Death’s brother Sleep, which is something that won’t require too much in the way of domino-like cascading consequences.
I did go kind of crazy in the kitchen, though, making way more food than I needed for just me.
As a result, I opted to invite Brian and Kathleen over for dinner. They couldn’t make it, though, as Brian had duty and Kathleen had a Pilates class.
Or so they said.
It’s just as well that they didn’t come over – whether they honestly did have other engagements or not, the worthless liars – as nothing that I made really turned out well enough that I’d have wanted to share it with anyone.
Of the things I made today the one that turned out best was the loaf of Banana Bread, though the pasta dish I made to go along with the steaks and fried Polenta was okay, as was the marinara sauce I made for dipping the fried Polenta in.
The one thing I learned from my culinary experiments was that deep-frying is a pain in the ass and even hours later you still feel oily and gross.
Beyond cooking I really didn’t do much.
I opted to go for a walk sometime around 10, though I cut it kind of short as I was walking sans Nano, which made the walk kind of tedious.
The reason I was devoid of music was that the Nano’s battery will apparently drain if it’s not connected to a charger even though it’s not actually on.
The other major activity I engaged in was mounting the paper towel holder on the wall. This experience, coupled with my previous experiences, led me to the conclusion that this paper towel holder is evil incarnate. I can’t even put into words what a pain in the ass the thing is, nor can I explain just how much I hate it. The worst part is how deceptively perfect the thing is. I mean, it looks nice, the color matches my cabinets quite nicely, and it should be a simple, straightforward device, but it’s not. It’s the Devil’s Paper Towel holder.
Look upon the face of pure evil. Don't let it fool you the way it fooled me. This thing is absolute evil. Stephen King could probably write a best-selling horror novel about my paper towel holder. Something similar to Christine, only, you know, with a paper towel holder instead of a car. Hell, King could actually write it on paper towels and it would probably still be a best-seller.
Despite what people may think – and yes, I am aware of how often I have to start off sentences with that declaration – I’m really not a very morbid person.
Pessimistic? Sure. Negative? I guess.
But morbid? Not really.
For example, I don’t spend much time thinking about my own death. I have, however, previously come to the conclusion that, despite the heart attack that looms inevitably in my future, it will be some kind of stupid accident that does me in, the kind of thing that gets labeled as “death by misadventure.”
I’d concluded that it will almost certainly happen in the home and that I’ll be dead for days before anyone notices, but I was never really sure what, exactly, the fatal mishap will be. Certainly it will be the result of some kind of idiotic carelessness, like electrocuting myself trying to get a bagel out of the toaster with a butter knife or something equally retarded.
Today, however, I actually had a vision of how it will go down, though not when it will go down.
Basically, what will happen is this.
I’ll be in my bathroom – either the bathroom here, or in another place with a bathroom very much like the one here – and I’ll have occasion to try to tinker with something on the ceiling.
Rather than get a step ladder, I’ll opt to stand on the toilet. Because I’ll be in my stocking feet, I will slip on the slick porcelain. Flailing about wildly, I’ll grab onto the shower curtain rod, steadying myself briefly before applying too much force and yanking it free, causing myself to fall sideways and crack my skull open on the edge of my bathroom sink.
Unconscious, I’ll bleed out into the vinyl tile, my pleather shower curtain (I’m pretty sure that I will always have a faux leather shower curtain no matter where I’m living) serving as my death shroud.
Ideally this is quite some time down the line, but the point is that it’s easily plausible, especially considering that I actually have had occasion to stand on my toilet in to tinker with something on the ceiling (the exhaust fan).
So it’ll either be that or I’ll be in the kitchen and drop a fork on my foot and cut myself. The cut will become infected and I’ll be too lazy to see a doctor about it and I’ll die from the infection.
Or…
Well, there are just too many stupid ways for me to die, but I’m sure that one day I’ll find the one that’s just right for me.
And there is always a very good chance that I will be killed by my evil paper towel holder.
Okay, so maybe I am a little bit morbid, but I don’t devote a lot of time thinking about the various Rube Goldbergian ways in which the Universe might make use of my laziness, negligence, and clumsiness to take me out once and for all, though ever since Showtime canceled Dead Like Me I’ve been forced to come up with my own convoluted death scenes.
In any case, I think it’s time for me to visit Death’s brother Sleep, which is something that won’t require too much in the way of domino-like cascading consequences.
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
Random Cool Stuff
If I ever do somehow manage to acquire an island of my own complete with a big house built to my specifications, you can be certain that I'll be contacting the people over at hiddenpassageways.com.
Coolest. Contractors. Ever.
Somewhere along the line I also might have some business for the people over at herobuilders.com, manufacturers of custom action figures.
Both sites are a little on the pricey site, but still extremely cool.
This video makes me glad that I never got into role-playing games...not that my lovelife is any better than those of the guys in the video.
And now, I think, it's time for bed.
Coolest. Contractors. Ever.
Somewhere along the line I also might have some business for the people over at herobuilders.com, manufacturers of custom action figures.
Both sites are a little on the pricey site, but still extremely cool.
This video makes me glad that I never got into role-playing games...not that my lovelife is any better than those of the guys in the video.
And now, I think, it's time for bed.
Fun With Crappy Old Comics
Frequently people post scans of very old comics to the comics newsgroups, and, against my better judgment, almost as frequently I check them out.
To be honest, most of them are just crap, and they make me wonder how comic books ever managed to make it out of their infancy. I mean, honestly, who would read this crap and why?
...
Okay, so I read this crap, but generally I do so with a cynical and ironic amusement about just how bad they are.
In any case, here are some of the highlights of what I found.
I was going to call my imaginary island paradise "The Fortress of Solitude," but that seemed too obvious. However, thanks to this story about Superman's other home, I've got a better name for it: Supermanor!
With a cover like this, how could I not be drawn in to read the story?
It seems to me that this is a very good way to lose an arm.
Wow. Just wow.
For the record, he wasn't a real caveman, just some circus strongman who'd been hired by a movie company to drum up advance publicity for a movie they were making. That he spoke English - however broken - should have been Superman's first clue that "Gob-Gob" wasn't the real deal, but hey give the guy a break. I mean, he just found out that his girlfriend is a kinky bitch who likes it rough. Maybe that wouldn't be a big deal to most guys, but for one thing, Supes is from Kansas. For another, he can't give her the kind of rough treatment she wants. After all, one good yank on her hair and it's "so long scalp."
The lesson I learned from this story (Superman found out that it was a scam shortly after "Gob-Gob" was mobbed and nearly trampled to death by a pack of hysterical women eager for a little "caveman lovin'" at the premiere of his movie) is that even in the 50's nerdy "nice" guys were bitching about how women only like assholes.
To be honest, most of them are just crap, and they make me wonder how comic books ever managed to make it out of their infancy. I mean, honestly, who would read this crap and why?
...
Okay, so I read this crap, but generally I do so with a cynical and ironic amusement about just how bad they are.
In any case, here are some of the highlights of what I found.
I was going to call my imaginary island paradise "The Fortress of Solitude," but that seemed too obvious. However, thanks to this story about Superman's other home, I've got a better name for it: Supermanor!
With a cover like this, how could I not be drawn in to read the story?
It seems to me that this is a very good way to lose an arm.
Wow. Just wow.
For the record, he wasn't a real caveman, just some circus strongman who'd been hired by a movie company to drum up advance publicity for a movie they were making. That he spoke English - however broken - should have been Superman's first clue that "Gob-Gob" wasn't the real deal, but hey give the guy a break. I mean, he just found out that his girlfriend is a kinky bitch who likes it rough. Maybe that wouldn't be a big deal to most guys, but for one thing, Supes is from Kansas. For another, he can't give her the kind of rough treatment she wants. After all, one good yank on her hair and it's "so long scalp."
The lesson I learned from this story (Superman found out that it was a scam shortly after "Gob-Gob" was mobbed and nearly trampled to death by a pack of hysterical women eager for a little "caveman lovin'" at the premiere of his movie) is that even in the 50's nerdy "nice" guys were bitching about how women only like assholes.
Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Only My Hairdresser Knows For Sure
This morning at around 5:15 I became aware of what sounded like static emanating from my alarm clock.
Groggily, I reached over and started hitting buttons until it stopped.
At that point I became just slightly more awake, to the extent that I was aware of what time it was (though not what day) and that it seemed as though my alarm clock had been making an abortive attempt at going off.
That was when panic struck, as, still not fully awake, I started attempting to perform logical operations in my head based on the following set of observations:
Groggily, I reached over and started hitting buttons until it stopped.
At that point I became just slightly more awake, to the extent that I was aware of what time it was (though not what day) and that it seemed as though my alarm clock had been making an abortive attempt at going off.
That was when panic struck, as, still not fully awake, I started attempting to perform logical operations in my head based on the following set of observations:
- It was 5:15 in the morning.
- I was awoken by a sound my alarm clock had made.
- Off the top of my head, I had no idea what day it was.
The logical conclusion I came to based on these observations was that it was Friday, Saturday, or Sunday, my alarm clock, for whatever reason, had failed to properly go off at the correct time, possibly because the iPod couldn’t turn on and start playing music, and as a result I had overslept by fifteen minutes. The immediate course of action I needed to take, it followed, was to haul ass to the bathroom to take a quick shower, get dressed, and try to make my way in to work on time.
As I started to do this, I realized that the little icons that indicate that the alarm is turned on and that the iPod is the alarm source hadn’t been displaying on the clock when I’d rolled over to see what time it was, and, in fact, had appeared, briefly, when I was randomly hitting buttons and had hit the “Alarm On/Off” button, which meant that I’d either turned the alarm off when it came on fifteen minutes earlier, which seemed unlikely, or else I hadn’t turned the alarm on the night before.
With the assistance of the adrenaline that started flowing when I “realized” that I’d overslept for work, I’d become more fully awake and thought, “Why would I go to bed without turning the alarm on?”
Halfway to the bathroom the answer came to me: because it wasn’t the weekend, and I was not, in fact, going to be late for work.
Shaking my head in irritation, I made my way back to bed, having since figured out what day it actually was.
Eventually I managed to get back to sleep, though I still haven’t figured out why my alarm clock was making that noise.
Maybe it was some form of EVP, though if it was a ghost I probably wouldn’t have been interested in hearing what it had to say anyway. Nothing against ghosts, it’s just that I have little interest in hearing what most living people have to say, and I can’t really believe that dying does all that much to improve a person’s personality or the quality of things he or she has to say. Besides, I’m not interested in hearing what anyone – living or dead – has to say at 5:15 in the morning.
After I got back to sleep I actually “slept in” a bit, getting up sometime after 9.
I had a lot of stuff planned for the day, so I didn’t sit around for too long before I got to it.
First up was stopping at my bank to deposit the refund check from Adelphia.
Next on the agenda was getting a haircut.
Rather than the usual unattractive Hispanic or Asian lady, today I got my hair cut by an effeminate man of indeterminate ethnicity (I want to say Hispanic, but his accent wasn’t Hispanic), who had many positive things to say about the color of my hair, which I found a bit puzzling.
No, I wasn’t worried that he was coming on to me, it’s just that I hardly view my hair color as anything special.
Apparently, though, it is.
He asked, “Your hair, it’s naturally that way?”
I said that it was.
“So no dyes or anything? No highlights?”
I said no.
With a certain reverence, he said, “Ohhh, people pay lots of money to get their hair like yours.”
I wanted to say, “You mean people pay money to get their hair to look like some shitty shade of brownish-blonde that’s gone prematurely gray?” but didn’t. Nor did I say, in response to him speculating that people would love to know my “secret” that it consists of internalizing stress and anger, spending five years engaged in heavy drinking, and just letting time take care of the rest.
“So nice, with the streaks and highlights,” he said, eyeing the mounting pile of my shorn locks on the floor as if he had some kind of secret plan for them.
Maybe he’ll work out some new style based on my hair, and suddenly we’ll be seeing people all over sporting “The Jon Look.”
God, what a nightmare that would be, like walking around in some kind of extra-lame Bizarro World.
(As an aside, Kathleen pointed out that the guy might have just been hitting on me, which is, I suppose, entirely possible. If that was the case, I appreciate the sentiment, though I still haven’t reached a level of desperation that would make me even slightly interested.)
He wanted to stop cutting my hair at the point when it’s sort of puffy and round on top and makes me look like nothing so much as a Monchichi, but I told him that I wanted it shorter, so he broke out the clippers and buzzed it down closer to the scalp.
From there I went to the optometrist and picked up another three-month supply of contact lens cleaning solution, and headed off in search of a late breakfast/early lunch.
Breakfast/lunch was at the combo Taco Bell/KFC. Usually I order from the Taco Bell side of the menu, but the other night I was thinking about how long it’s been since I’ve had KFC, so that was the route I took.
After Scott and Brian were talking about some study that found that fast food ice frequently has more germs – and fecal matter – in it than the toilet water at the same restaurant, I opted not to get ice.
I was actually reminded of the study by the fact that an employee was cleaning up a mess by the drink dispenser that smelled very much like raw sewage. I’m not sure what happened there. Maybe someone spilled some ice.
After that it was on to Wal-Mart where I finally picked up some lamps. I’ve been needing new lamps for a while, as I’ve been getting by with only one, but I haven’t been able to find any that I liked. Today I decided that I was just going to go with the least objectionable.
I got a floor lamp for my bedroom, a small desk lamp for my nightstand, and a table lamp to put by the front door so that I can have some light when I get home from work and am putting my shoes and jacket in the closet.
From Wal-Mart it was on to the grocery store, and then home.
As I said, this was a very busy day by my standards.
Once I got home and put the groceries away and put the lamps together it was a bit after 2. Normally the mail is in by that time, so I headed over to check it. The mailman had just arrived, so I headed back home. I then decided to grab the Nano and go for a walk.
By the time I got back from my walk it was 3:30 and the mailman was still here, having just gotten started on the block of mailboxes that mine is in.
I hung out for a while, waiting, but it was becoming apparent that the mailman just didn’t want to go to the next stop on his route and was deliberately taking his time here, so I went home again.
Once there I discovered that while I had, for a change, closely followed my shopping list, there were some things that I’d forgotten to put on the list, so I headed over to Super Target.
That my mail, when I finally was able to get it on my way back home, was all junk was pretty irritating.
I’d been planning to make a fairly big dinner, using a couple Crazy Hot Italian recipes, but just as I was sitting down to watch Giada my phone went off to let me know that I’d gotten a text message from Brian.
He was inviting me to join them for dinner at what has, apparently, become their local hangout, the sports bar that Brian and I had lunch at last week.
I opted to join them, though this meant that I had to put my plans for making a pot roast in my newly acquired crock pot (technically it’s a “slow cooker,” as “Crock Pot” is a brand name) tomorrow. I’d bought the roast today and hadn’t put it in the freezer yet.
However, I have to use the meat that I thawed out for today’s meal tomorrow, so I had to put the roast in the freezer and postpone it until another day.
The sports bar, or rather “Sports Café,” was pretty packed. Brian, Kathleen, and I were joined by their friend Rebecca, who had gone to my realtor’s holiday party with Kathleen and I back in December.
Once I got out of the bar I realized that I am officially, after nearly two years, a non-smoker, as I was conscious of just how much my clothes and hair smelled like cigarette smoke.
When I first got there the smoke didn’t bother me. In fact, it kind of made me want one of my own, but after a while it got to be a bit much.
And that was my busy, exciting day, the highlight of which was probably having the big-boobed waitress call me “hon.” She wasn’t real cute (though by default she was cuter than the guy who cut my hair), and I know she wasn’t expressing any sort of interest, but it honestly doesn’t take much to make my day. Also, there’s just a certain classic appeal to a waitress who calls you “hon,” though the overall effect would have been better if she were a gum-smacking waitress with a beehive working in some greasy spoon.
The burger I had was pretty good, if terribly unhealthy (which is why it was good), as it included two slices of Canadian Bacon.
For maximum flavor I would have upped the cholesterol ante, though, and added a fried egg.
But that’s just me.
In any case, that was my busy day.
Monday, February 27, 2006
The Thing About Experiments...
...is that they don't always succeed.
In my case, they very seldom do, and my latest, an attempt at rendering an image in a style that is reminiscent - without being a total rip-off - of the style of Adam Hughes, has proven to be no exception.
Still, the picture is as good as it's going to get, so I figured I might as well share it with you, though for Scott's sake, as he tends to read Threshold at work, I'm not posting a preview image, as the picture is fairly racy.
It's a picture of Red Sonja, as when I saw the source image I thought the outfit the model was (barely) wearing was very reminiscent of Sonja's.
Anyway, here it is.
Enjoy it or don't; you know the drill.
In my case, they very seldom do, and my latest, an attempt at rendering an image in a style that is reminiscent - without being a total rip-off - of the style of Adam Hughes, has proven to be no exception.
Still, the picture is as good as it's going to get, so I figured I might as well share it with you, though for Scott's sake, as he tends to read Threshold at work, I'm not posting a preview image, as the picture is fairly racy.
It's a picture of Red Sonja, as when I saw the source image I thought the outfit the model was (barely) wearing was very reminiscent of Sonja's.
Anyway, here it is.
Enjoy it or don't; you know the drill.
If It's Monday I Must Not Be Doing Anything
Last night when I got home from work I opted to do something that I only do a few times a year: order a pizza.
I went with that new thing from Pizza Hut with the cheese-filled crust.
Unfortunately, though not unexpectedly, the pizza was not delivered by Jessica Simpson.
Still, it did get delivered pretty quickly, so that much, at least, was a plus.
Knowing that I had dinner covered in the form of leftover pizza today, I decided that I wasn’t going to go anywhere, leaving the shopping and whatever else I might do out in the world for another day.
I did go for a short walk in the afternoon, though, and found that I do have nearby access to the W&OD trail system, so that’s a plus, if we assume that I can manage to get myself back into the habit of walking, which will, ideally, get me back into the habit of working out once again.
On my way back home I stopped to get the mail and found that I’d gotten my refund ($105) from Adelphia, as I’d paid more than I owed when I left Ashburn.
So that also was a plus.
Beyond that the day has been pretty uneventful. I first woke up a bit before 7 and said, “Screw that,” managing to force myself to go back to sleep until a bit before 9.
I had been very tired last night, as I’d had a lousy night’s sleep on Saturday.
This was precipitated by my having this randomly bizarre dream about the remake of The Hills Have Eyes. I woke up from the dream a bit after 1 am feeling a bit freaked out and found myself lying there alone in the dark with thoughts about all of the various movies about psychotic killers who lurk in the shadows coming unbidden to my mind, so getting back to sleep was a near-impossibility for about an hour and a half.
Once I did get back to sleep it wasn’t entirely restful, so it made for an extremely long Sunday once I got up for the day.
Things continued to be on a downturn after I got up, as I found that the first twenty seconds of every track on the CD I’d burned the night before were jacked up, making my drive in extremely irritating.
That it was an inordinately slow day didn’t help matters any.
As most of what I watch on Sundays either wasn’t on or was a rerun, I actually started on a new picture last night, one which I spent much of today working on as well.
Once again I’m playing around with the technique similar to the one I use for my “Naglesque” pictures, but overall I’m going for an Adam Hughes effect.
So far it’s working, mostly, but I need to find a better way to achieve the desired effect, as the current technique I’m using takes a long time and makes for extremely large files.
If I manage to finish it tonight I’ll post it.
In the meantime, I suppose I should try doing some more work on it.
I went with that new thing from Pizza Hut with the cheese-filled crust.
Unfortunately, though not unexpectedly, the pizza was not delivered by Jessica Simpson.
Still, it did get delivered pretty quickly, so that much, at least, was a plus.
Knowing that I had dinner covered in the form of leftover pizza today, I decided that I wasn’t going to go anywhere, leaving the shopping and whatever else I might do out in the world for another day.
I did go for a short walk in the afternoon, though, and found that I do have nearby access to the W&OD trail system, so that’s a plus, if we assume that I can manage to get myself back into the habit of walking, which will, ideally, get me back into the habit of working out once again.
On my way back home I stopped to get the mail and found that I’d gotten my refund ($105) from Adelphia, as I’d paid more than I owed when I left Ashburn.
So that also was a plus.
Beyond that the day has been pretty uneventful. I first woke up a bit before 7 and said, “Screw that,” managing to force myself to go back to sleep until a bit before 9.
I had been very tired last night, as I’d had a lousy night’s sleep on Saturday.
This was precipitated by my having this randomly bizarre dream about the remake of The Hills Have Eyes. I woke up from the dream a bit after 1 am feeling a bit freaked out and found myself lying there alone in the dark with thoughts about all of the various movies about psychotic killers who lurk in the shadows coming unbidden to my mind, so getting back to sleep was a near-impossibility for about an hour and a half.
Once I did get back to sleep it wasn’t entirely restful, so it made for an extremely long Sunday once I got up for the day.
Things continued to be on a downturn after I got up, as I found that the first twenty seconds of every track on the CD I’d burned the night before were jacked up, making my drive in extremely irritating.
That it was an inordinately slow day didn’t help matters any.
As most of what I watch on Sundays either wasn’t on or was a rerun, I actually started on a new picture last night, one which I spent much of today working on as well.
Once again I’m playing around with the technique similar to the one I use for my “Naglesque” pictures, but overall I’m going for an Adam Hughes effect.
So far it’s working, mostly, but I need to find a better way to achieve the desired effect, as the current technique I’m using takes a long time and makes for extremely large files.
If I manage to finish it tonight I’ll post it.
In the meantime, I suppose I should try doing some more work on it.
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