This morning, as I usually do, I stopped in at a nearby convenience store before work.
When I got there, the song “Dreams” by Fleetwood Mac was playing on the in-store (and out-store – music is piped to the gas pumps) sound system.
As I opened the door, I heard Stevie Knicks warbling, “Say women they will come and they will go,” to which, internally, I responded, “In my case, mostly they’ll go.”
It’s already been a long, slow day and there are still nine hours to go, so that doesn’t bode well for today or the rest of the weekend.
Given his ridiculously low approval rating (36%), I can’t help but wonder when Bush will give a “You guys suck” speech to the American people. After all, when we don’t just blindly approve of everything our President does, the terrorists win.
Scott is in training today, so it’s just Brian and me at work (Alone at last!).
Of course, it’s not like we’re swamped with work as a result of being short one person as things have been incredibly, mind-numbingly slow of late.
In addition to making the days go by extremely slowly, the slowness is rather troubling, because it’s been, as Brian put it, layoff slow.
Still, the biggest concern is the boredom, the sheer, painful, soul-shattering boredom.
One major problem is that, really, all I have to do all day is surf the Internet, and the thing is, the Internet is boring.
There are a handful of sites (mostly blogs) that I go to on a regular basis, but they don’t update often enough to keep me entertained, and, quite frankly, I’m sick of trying to find new sites to check out. I’ve basically been done with the Internet since 2000. The novelty wore off long before that, but it was in 2000, in a similarly boring job with a high-speed connection, that I got to the point of saturation.
Sure, I still use it all the time, and I can’t really imagine living without it, but when it comes to spending twelve and a half hours trying to find stuff to pass the time on it, the Internet blows.
I guess I need to find something new out there because I just can’t take another Slashdot thread full of pointlessly angry comments from self-righteous nerds who think that their opinions actually matter to anyone (Yes, I know that sounds like a description of Threshold, but the major difference is that I realize that my opinion doesn’t matter to anyone).
But at the same time, as mentioned, I’m tired of looking for new things.
Of course, every so often the Internet does deliver up a gem, like this one.
So I guess it’s not all bad.
Friday, April 07, 2006
Thursday, April 06, 2006
The Problem With Thursdays Or I'll Have An Order Of Invisibility With A Side Of Low Self-Esteem
Thursdays are, for me, somewhat problematic.
The main issue with Thursdays is that they are extremely short, given my penchant for getting as much sleep as possible on work nights.
However, Thursdays also represent my last chance to accomplish anything before going back to work for three days, so generally it’s my intention to accomplish as much as I can before my early bedtime.
At least, that’s usually my intention on Wednesday night.
Come Thursday morning, though, when I recognize that it’s my last chance to be indolent before getting back into the grind, I find it nearly impossible to roll my lazy ass out of bed.
Once I do accomplish that much the enthusiasm of the previous evening has pretty much been used up, and I find myself just basically running out the clock.
Oh well; it’s not as though anything I’d be likely to accomplish would be especially significant.
Perhaps it’s the fact that I grew up so close to Wisconsin, but whatever the reason, I have an appreciation for cheese.
I’m not talking gouda or muenster, or really any kind of dairy product, I’m talking about cheese as in, things that are cheesy.
Specifically, I’m talking about cheesy movies. In fact the cheesier the…well, not better, certainly, but the more likely I am to be drawn in to watch.
It’s actually something of a misnomer to call it an appreciation. It’s more like a morbid attraction. I don’t really enjoy cheesy movies so much as I endure them.
I can’t really tell you why I subject myself to some of the painful cinematic endeavors of the chronically cheesy, but the fact remains that I am drawn to them.
(It’s hardly surprising that I’ve seen as much soft-core porn as I have, given that it tends to combine two things that I’m drawn to: cheesiness and hot naked chicks)
Many cheesy movies are considered to be “cult classics.”
The term “cult classic” can mean many different things. For example, it can have subject matter that is so esoteric that it will only appeal to a very specific group of people.
Alternatively, might just be so bizarre that the majority of people just can’t look away, finding themselves mesmerized by the sheer randomness of it.
More often than not, I think, a movie achieves cult classic because it’s just so incredibly cheesy and bad that people can’t help but be taken in by it.
Such is the case with 1986’s Reform School Girls, which I noticed posted in a newsgroup the other night and found myself powerless to resist.
The title alone tells you that the movie will be cheesy and exploitative, which are often key ingredients in the making of a cult classic.
Add to that the fact that the movie featured the late Wendy O. Williams of The Plasmatics, as well as B movie queen Sybil Danning, and you’ve got yourself a guaranteed box office bomb (most “cult classics” make very little money) that is destined to find its audience on video and late-night airings on Cinemax.
There were other elements besides the title, the iconic figures starring in it, and the gratuitous nudity, that helped make it a classic. Williams herself amped up the randomly bizarre aspects of the movie not only with her gravelly voice, or the fact that she was seldom seen wearing anything other than leather underwear, but by the simple fact that, while she was ostensibly portraying a teenager, she was, at the time of filming 36 years old.
The female lead, though, was, according to IMDb, only 16 at the time, which would actually make her as old now as Williams was then, and which also leads me to wonder about the legality of all of her nude scenes.
In any case, it had been at least 16 years since I last saw this celluloid cheesefest, but it was pretty much exactly as formulaic as I remembered it.
The story is a familiar one to anyone who’s ever watched a movie late at night on Cinemax.
Jenny is a good(ish) girl who makes a foolish decision that lands her in hot water.
Once she’s behind bars she faces the sadistically Sapphic guards who delight in hosing down their charges and engaging in cavity searches, the fat, cruel bitch in charge, and the tough chick fellow inmate (Williams) who runs the show on the inside with the tacit approval – or at least willful blindness – of the guards and the head matron.
Luckily our Jenny is a tough cookie and can take whatever they dish out, all the while taking the weaker, more vulnerable Lisa under her wing, just as the sweetly Sapphic guidance counselor (who hopes to reform the reform school) has taken Jenny under her wing.
(Randomly bizarre note: Sherri Stoner, who played weakling Lisa, went on to provide the voice of Slappy Squirrel on Animaniacs)
Lisa serves as a sort of trophy in the battle of wills between Jenny and Williams’ Charlie, and Jenny finds that she can’t turn her back for a second, leading to Lisa’s eventual torture (and ass-branding) by Charlie.
This happens because Jenny is too busy making some more of her patented foolish decisions by giving her virtue to the slick delivery driver who promises to sneak her out in his truck. It’s after he sells her out that she, inevitably, ends up in the hole.
Ultimately Jenny, stronger and wiser for her suffering, leads a revolt that results in an inquiry into the way things are run at the school spearheaded by the “nice” lesbian counselor, and Jenny is free to make her way in the world, a little wiser and a lot tougher. She’s going to make it!
That is, until she either gets hooked on junk and ends up peddling her ass on street corners or gets knocked up by the first guys who’s nice to her and whose greasy charm makes her forget the valuable lessons she learned bout trusting these hipsters and she gets knocked up and ends her days living in a trailer somewhere after having learned how to milk the welfare system for all it’s worth.
But that’s another story.
Pepper this with some gratuitous shower scenes, some vaguely homoerotic imagery, and you’ve got yourself a cult classic cheesefest, or pretty much any women’s prison movie ever made.
Of course, since 1986 women’s prison movies have changed a bit, mostly in terms of the lesbian content. In the old movies, the lesbians were almost without exception (except for the kindly counselor/social worker/nurse) evil predators, and the execution of any actual lesbian content was limited to a rape scene, though there were, on occasion, the scene in which our heroine politely demurs as her cellmate makes a gentle pass at her.
Now it’s hot girl on girl action everywhere, with even the heroine getting in on the action.
I’m not complaining, obviously, merely commenting on the change that’s taken place in the otherwise static field of women in prison moviemaking.
In any case, Reform School Girls does have one major flaw as a cheesy cult classic: it was intended to be cheesy.
The movie was itself an homage of sorts to the cheesetacular exploitation epics of the 1970’s such as Cell Block Sisters (nobody does cheese or exploitation the way they did it in the 70s), and so is derivative in its cheesiness.
Derivativeness can often be a “good” thing in this area, but in this case, the fact that the filmmakers did not set out to make something better than the end result, but rather decided to make a cheesy exploitation movie without any noble pretensions, ultimately it falls short on the Ed Wood scale of cheesiness.
Still, if you have a high threshold of cheese, Reform School Girls is worth checking out, or, as was the case with me, giving a second look.
Between starting this post and the point at which I’m writing this I had to head in to work for a meeting.
On the way home I decided to stop somewhere for lunch, though I wasn’t sure where I wanted to go. I had semi-decided on Quizno’s, but on the way there I spotted the Ruby Tuesday and thought, “Why not?”
The answer to that question is typically, “Because I feel uncomfortable going into a sit-down restaurant by myself,” but I decided, foolishly, to pretend that I didn’t know the answer. After all, what’s the big deal?
(To avoid being there by myself I thought about giving Brian a call, but I figured he’d probably had lunch already, having found some way to gain sustenance from his FIOS connection, the rat bastard)
Given that it was after two on a Thursday afternoon, I was a bit puzzled by the number of people there and the fact that I had to wait a few minutes to be seated. I just don’t understand why there are so many people out and about on weekday afternoons. Don’t people have jobs?
Once I was seated I looked through the menu and decided what I want before anyone came to ask me what I wanted to drink. This isn’t because I was unusually decisive, it was because I was being totally ignored by the wait staff.
It was, admittedly, somewhat busy in there, but it wasn’t exactly crazy, and there was plenty of time for someone to stop by my table, but the three girls working that section just kept whizzing past me.
(As an aside, one of the waitresses looked rather a lot like I imagine Pamela Anderson would look if she’d never been “discovered” and had all of the “enhancements.” She actually made a show of deliberately ignoring me as she went past.)
Finally, when I was about to say something as she went past, one of the girls – cute-ish pregnant blonde – noticed me drumming my fingers on the closed menu and took pity on me.
She didn’t make any attempt at friendly conversation, and pretty much fled from my table as soon as I’d made my order.
After she brought me my order, which, I realized as I was halfway through it, wasn’t what I’d actually ordered – I’d ordered a Bacon Jack Burger and she brought me a Bacon Burger minus the Jack – I pretty much didn’t see her again until I was done and she brought me the check. No, “How is everything?” or “You doing all right?” or any of the standard mid-meal interruptions.
Given that she – and the other girls – did do all of those things at other tables, it wasn’t’ a matter of her not engaging in that sort of behavior at all.
Bad as the service was, though, it never really got to the point of being something to complain about to the waitress or the manager or anything, it was just bad enough to make me feel, I don’t know, unwelcome, I guess.
I’m not sure what the problem was. Maybe the fact that I was a guy there by himself had them worried that I was going to hit on them or something and they just wanted to preemptively give me the cold shoulder.
(And no, it wasn’t just my imagination)
Whatever the case, I had decided that I was going to stiff her as far as the tip went, but then I felt bad because she was knocked up, so I decided that I at least had to give her a minimal one.
Still, the whole experience was kind of off-putting.
Leave it to me to have a simple late lunch turn into a major blow to my self-esteem.
*Sigh*
In any case, as stated at the start of this entry, it is Thursday, so I have to start preparing for my work week.
Update:
Earlier in this post I erroneously stated that the heroine of Reform School Girls, Jenny, a sensitive, tough cookie, gave her virtue away in an escape attempt.
It should be noted that, as part of her tragic backstory, as confessed to the kindly lesbian counselor, Jenny’s virtue had already been stolen by her daddy when she was younger.
This probably goes a long way towards explaining the series of foolish decisions she would subsequently make, as it would give her even more daddy issues than the average girl, but in any case, she was not a virgin when she got underneath that sleazy delivery guy, so there’s no greater significance to the scene than the fact that she was just straight-up whoring herself out in order to get a favor, and undoubtedly not for the first – or last – time.
Just thought I should set the record straight.
The main issue with Thursdays is that they are extremely short, given my penchant for getting as much sleep as possible on work nights.
However, Thursdays also represent my last chance to accomplish anything before going back to work for three days, so generally it’s my intention to accomplish as much as I can before my early bedtime.
At least, that’s usually my intention on Wednesday night.
Come Thursday morning, though, when I recognize that it’s my last chance to be indolent before getting back into the grind, I find it nearly impossible to roll my lazy ass out of bed.
Once I do accomplish that much the enthusiasm of the previous evening has pretty much been used up, and I find myself just basically running out the clock.
Oh well; it’s not as though anything I’d be likely to accomplish would be especially significant.
Perhaps it’s the fact that I grew up so close to Wisconsin, but whatever the reason, I have an appreciation for cheese.
I’m not talking gouda or muenster, or really any kind of dairy product, I’m talking about cheese as in, things that are cheesy.
Specifically, I’m talking about cheesy movies. In fact the cheesier the…well, not better, certainly, but the more likely I am to be drawn in to watch.
It’s actually something of a misnomer to call it an appreciation. It’s more like a morbid attraction. I don’t really enjoy cheesy movies so much as I endure them.
I can’t really tell you why I subject myself to some of the painful cinematic endeavors of the chronically cheesy, but the fact remains that I am drawn to them.
(It’s hardly surprising that I’ve seen as much soft-core porn as I have, given that it tends to combine two things that I’m drawn to: cheesiness and hot naked chicks)
Many cheesy movies are considered to be “cult classics.”
The term “cult classic” can mean many different things. For example, it can have subject matter that is so esoteric that it will only appeal to a very specific group of people.
Alternatively, might just be so bizarre that the majority of people just can’t look away, finding themselves mesmerized by the sheer randomness of it.
More often than not, I think, a movie achieves cult classic because it’s just so incredibly cheesy and bad that people can’t help but be taken in by it.
Such is the case with 1986’s Reform School Girls, which I noticed posted in a newsgroup the other night and found myself powerless to resist.
The title alone tells you that the movie will be cheesy and exploitative, which are often key ingredients in the making of a cult classic.
Add to that the fact that the movie featured the late Wendy O. Williams of The Plasmatics, as well as B movie queen Sybil Danning, and you’ve got yourself a guaranteed box office bomb (most “cult classics” make very little money) that is destined to find its audience on video and late-night airings on Cinemax.
There were other elements besides the title, the iconic figures starring in it, and the gratuitous nudity, that helped make it a classic. Williams herself amped up the randomly bizarre aspects of the movie not only with her gravelly voice, or the fact that she was seldom seen wearing anything other than leather underwear, but by the simple fact that, while she was ostensibly portraying a teenager, she was, at the time of filming 36 years old.
The female lead, though, was, according to IMDb, only 16 at the time, which would actually make her as old now as Williams was then, and which also leads me to wonder about the legality of all of her nude scenes.
In any case, it had been at least 16 years since I last saw this celluloid cheesefest, but it was pretty much exactly as formulaic as I remembered it.
The story is a familiar one to anyone who’s ever watched a movie late at night on Cinemax.
Jenny is a good(ish) girl who makes a foolish decision that lands her in hot water.
Once she’s behind bars she faces the sadistically Sapphic guards who delight in hosing down their charges and engaging in cavity searches, the fat, cruel bitch in charge, and the tough chick fellow inmate (Williams) who runs the show on the inside with the tacit approval – or at least willful blindness – of the guards and the head matron.
Luckily our Jenny is a tough cookie and can take whatever they dish out, all the while taking the weaker, more vulnerable Lisa under her wing, just as the sweetly Sapphic guidance counselor (who hopes to reform the reform school) has taken Jenny under her wing.
(Randomly bizarre note: Sherri Stoner, who played weakling Lisa, went on to provide the voice of Slappy Squirrel on Animaniacs)
Lisa serves as a sort of trophy in the battle of wills between Jenny and Williams’ Charlie, and Jenny finds that she can’t turn her back for a second, leading to Lisa’s eventual torture (and ass-branding) by Charlie.
This happens because Jenny is too busy making some more of her patented foolish decisions by giving her virtue to the slick delivery driver who promises to sneak her out in his truck. It’s after he sells her out that she, inevitably, ends up in the hole.
Ultimately Jenny, stronger and wiser for her suffering, leads a revolt that results in an inquiry into the way things are run at the school spearheaded by the “nice” lesbian counselor, and Jenny is free to make her way in the world, a little wiser and a lot tougher. She’s going to make it!
That is, until she either gets hooked on junk and ends up peddling her ass on street corners or gets knocked up by the first guys who’s nice to her and whose greasy charm makes her forget the valuable lessons she learned bout trusting these hipsters and she gets knocked up and ends her days living in a trailer somewhere after having learned how to milk the welfare system for all it’s worth.
But that’s another story.
Pepper this with some gratuitous shower scenes, some vaguely homoerotic imagery, and you’ve got yourself a cult classic cheesefest, or pretty much any women’s prison movie ever made.
Of course, since 1986 women’s prison movies have changed a bit, mostly in terms of the lesbian content. In the old movies, the lesbians were almost without exception (except for the kindly counselor/social worker/nurse) evil predators, and the execution of any actual lesbian content was limited to a rape scene, though there were, on occasion, the scene in which our heroine politely demurs as her cellmate makes a gentle pass at her.
Now it’s hot girl on girl action everywhere, with even the heroine getting in on the action.
I’m not complaining, obviously, merely commenting on the change that’s taken place in the otherwise static field of women in prison moviemaking.
In any case, Reform School Girls does have one major flaw as a cheesy cult classic: it was intended to be cheesy.
The movie was itself an homage of sorts to the cheesetacular exploitation epics of the 1970’s such as Cell Block Sisters (nobody does cheese or exploitation the way they did it in the 70s), and so is derivative in its cheesiness.
Derivativeness can often be a “good” thing in this area, but in this case, the fact that the filmmakers did not set out to make something better than the end result, but rather decided to make a cheesy exploitation movie without any noble pretensions, ultimately it falls short on the Ed Wood scale of cheesiness.
Still, if you have a high threshold of cheese, Reform School Girls is worth checking out, or, as was the case with me, giving a second look.
Between starting this post and the point at which I’m writing this I had to head in to work for a meeting.
On the way home I decided to stop somewhere for lunch, though I wasn’t sure where I wanted to go. I had semi-decided on Quizno’s, but on the way there I spotted the Ruby Tuesday and thought, “Why not?”
The answer to that question is typically, “Because I feel uncomfortable going into a sit-down restaurant by myself,” but I decided, foolishly, to pretend that I didn’t know the answer. After all, what’s the big deal?
(To avoid being there by myself I thought about giving Brian a call, but I figured he’d probably had lunch already, having found some way to gain sustenance from his FIOS connection, the rat bastard)
Given that it was after two on a Thursday afternoon, I was a bit puzzled by the number of people there and the fact that I had to wait a few minutes to be seated. I just don’t understand why there are so many people out and about on weekday afternoons. Don’t people have jobs?
Once I was seated I looked through the menu and decided what I want before anyone came to ask me what I wanted to drink. This isn’t because I was unusually decisive, it was because I was being totally ignored by the wait staff.
It was, admittedly, somewhat busy in there, but it wasn’t exactly crazy, and there was plenty of time for someone to stop by my table, but the three girls working that section just kept whizzing past me.
(As an aside, one of the waitresses looked rather a lot like I imagine Pamela Anderson would look if she’d never been “discovered” and had all of the “enhancements.” She actually made a show of deliberately ignoring me as she went past.)
Finally, when I was about to say something as she went past, one of the girls – cute-ish pregnant blonde – noticed me drumming my fingers on the closed menu and took pity on me.
She didn’t make any attempt at friendly conversation, and pretty much fled from my table as soon as I’d made my order.
After she brought me my order, which, I realized as I was halfway through it, wasn’t what I’d actually ordered – I’d ordered a Bacon Jack Burger and she brought me a Bacon Burger minus the Jack – I pretty much didn’t see her again until I was done and she brought me the check. No, “How is everything?” or “You doing all right?” or any of the standard mid-meal interruptions.
Given that she – and the other girls – did do all of those things at other tables, it wasn’t’ a matter of her not engaging in that sort of behavior at all.
Bad as the service was, though, it never really got to the point of being something to complain about to the waitress or the manager or anything, it was just bad enough to make me feel, I don’t know, unwelcome, I guess.
I’m not sure what the problem was. Maybe the fact that I was a guy there by himself had them worried that I was going to hit on them or something and they just wanted to preemptively give me the cold shoulder.
(And no, it wasn’t just my imagination)
Whatever the case, I had decided that I was going to stiff her as far as the tip went, but then I felt bad because she was knocked up, so I decided that I at least had to give her a minimal one.
Still, the whole experience was kind of off-putting.
Leave it to me to have a simple late lunch turn into a major blow to my self-esteem.
*Sigh*
In any case, as stated at the start of this entry, it is Thursday, so I have to start preparing for my work week.
Update:
Earlier in this post I erroneously stated that the heroine of Reform School Girls, Jenny, a sensitive, tough cookie, gave her virtue away in an escape attempt.
It should be noted that, as part of her tragic backstory, as confessed to the kindly lesbian counselor, Jenny’s virtue had already been stolen by her daddy when she was younger.
This probably goes a long way towards explaining the series of foolish decisions she would subsequently make, as it would give her even more daddy issues than the average girl, but in any case, she was not a virgin when she got underneath that sleazy delivery guy, so there’s no greater significance to the scene than the fact that she was just straight-up whoring herself out in order to get a favor, and undoubtedly not for the first – or last – time.
Just thought I should set the record straight.
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
Not-So Guilty Pleasure
Recently, I’ve been thinking that I should get “back to basics” to some extent.
Toward that end, this morning I headed to Super Target and picked up a sketch pad and some pencils, with the eventual goal of doing some “old school” drawing in the hopes of improving my “new school” efforts.
We’ll see what happens, I guess.
While I was there I also picked up some new workout clothes, as it’s my intention to get back into getting regular exercise.
Again, we’ll see what happens.
Once I got home from Super Target I sat down to eat lunch.
A while back I bought a paperback copy of one of my favorite books, which I no longer had in any form. That tends to happen with that book, given that a consequence of my enjoyment of the book is the desire to share it with others. It is a book, I feel, that the uninitiated are that much the poorer for not having read.
In any case, as a result of wanting to share it with others I tend to lend the book out a lot, and the last time I had done so, several years ago, I never got it back, having left the state and forgetting that it wasn’t in my possession.
In any case, I bought a copy of it again recently and, almost immediately, loaned it out to Scott.
This time around, though, it was returned to me, and, in fact, was sitting on my dining room table, where I had placed it when I got home from work the day, several weeks ago, that Scott had given it back.
(The book in question is Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny, for those of you wondering.)
In any case, as I was sitting down at the table to eat lunch today I happened to pick the book up and start reading it, despite the fact that I’m in the middle of reading another book (which I’m not much enjoying, but have committed myself to reading), and the fact the I just received two other books as a gift from my friend Kevin.
Picking it up and starting to read it was a mistake, as it managed, as it always does, to draw me in and make me want to read it, and essentially made a liar out of me, as I’d told Kevin that I don’t often set aside time to sit down and read.
Normally that’s true (though odd, considering how much time I used to spend reading), and most of my reading is done to pass the time when I’m sitting down in one particular room.
In any case, after I finished lunch I did manage to put the book down while I went for a walk, but once I got home I picked it up, parked my ass on the couch, and read for about two hours.
As much as I was enjoying it – the book is a straight-up masterpiece and never disappoints – I felt a little guilty at the same time. After all, there are the aforementioned other books that I could – and possibly should – be reading.
Still, I don’t feel too guilty about it because it’s just that good.
The one problem, though, is that after I finish it, anything else I read is going to seem (justifiably so) inferior.
This is really bad news considering that I’ll likely return to reading a book that I already wasn’t enjoying.
Oh well.
Despite being a company I’d never heard of before, the cable provider I have here seems okay. The one problem I have is that, in contrast to what I had in Ashburn, the speed of my Internet connection is appallingly slow. It’s better than dial-up, and even most flavors of DSL, but still, it’s not blazingly fast.
I’m bothered even more by the slowness because as of today I’m extremely jealous of Brian. Not because he’s tall, has a wife, a bigger house, and is filled with the spirit of volunteerism and community service, but because today he was scheduled to get hooked up with Verizon’s FIOS. FIOS is a fiber-optic based Internet connection that is much, much, MUCH faster than most cable and DSL connections, and is, therefore WAY faster than my connection.
Naturally it’s not available in my area. *Sigh*
This was made even more bothersome by the fact that on today of all days my cable actually opted to go out for a few hours, putting an end to my rationalization that, while slower, it’s at least more reliable than what I had in Ashburn. Now I’m left with “At least they fixed the outage faster than Adelphia.”
In any case, I think I’m going to get back to my not-so guilty pleasure.
Toward that end, this morning I headed to Super Target and picked up a sketch pad and some pencils, with the eventual goal of doing some “old school” drawing in the hopes of improving my “new school” efforts.
We’ll see what happens, I guess.
While I was there I also picked up some new workout clothes, as it’s my intention to get back into getting regular exercise.
Again, we’ll see what happens.
Once I got home from Super Target I sat down to eat lunch.
A while back I bought a paperback copy of one of my favorite books, which I no longer had in any form. That tends to happen with that book, given that a consequence of my enjoyment of the book is the desire to share it with others. It is a book, I feel, that the uninitiated are that much the poorer for not having read.
In any case, as a result of wanting to share it with others I tend to lend the book out a lot, and the last time I had done so, several years ago, I never got it back, having left the state and forgetting that it wasn’t in my possession.
In any case, I bought a copy of it again recently and, almost immediately, loaned it out to Scott.
This time around, though, it was returned to me, and, in fact, was sitting on my dining room table, where I had placed it when I got home from work the day, several weeks ago, that Scott had given it back.
(The book in question is Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny, for those of you wondering.)
In any case, as I was sitting down at the table to eat lunch today I happened to pick the book up and start reading it, despite the fact that I’m in the middle of reading another book (which I’m not much enjoying, but have committed myself to reading), and the fact the I just received two other books as a gift from my friend Kevin.
Picking it up and starting to read it was a mistake, as it managed, as it always does, to draw me in and make me want to read it, and essentially made a liar out of me, as I’d told Kevin that I don’t often set aside time to sit down and read.
Normally that’s true (though odd, considering how much time I used to spend reading), and most of my reading is done to pass the time when I’m sitting down in one particular room.
In any case, after I finished lunch I did manage to put the book down while I went for a walk, but once I got home I picked it up, parked my ass on the couch, and read for about two hours.
As much as I was enjoying it – the book is a straight-up masterpiece and never disappoints – I felt a little guilty at the same time. After all, there are the aforementioned other books that I could – and possibly should – be reading.
Still, I don’t feel too guilty about it because it’s just that good.
The one problem, though, is that after I finish it, anything else I read is going to seem (justifiably so) inferior.
This is really bad news considering that I’ll likely return to reading a book that I already wasn’t enjoying.
Oh well.
Despite being a company I’d never heard of before, the cable provider I have here seems okay. The one problem I have is that, in contrast to what I had in Ashburn, the speed of my Internet connection is appallingly slow. It’s better than dial-up, and even most flavors of DSL, but still, it’s not blazingly fast.
I’m bothered even more by the slowness because as of today I’m extremely jealous of Brian. Not because he’s tall, has a wife, a bigger house, and is filled with the spirit of volunteerism and community service, but because today he was scheduled to get hooked up with Verizon’s FIOS. FIOS is a fiber-optic based Internet connection that is much, much, MUCH faster than most cable and DSL connections, and is, therefore WAY faster than my connection.
Naturally it’s not available in my area. *Sigh*
This was made even more bothersome by the fact that on today of all days my cable actually opted to go out for a few hours, putting an end to my rationalization that, while slower, it’s at least more reliable than what I had in Ashburn. Now I’m left with “At least they fixed the outage faster than Adelphia.”
In any case, I think I’m going to get back to my not-so guilty pleasure.
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Separating Out Raw Chicken? I Am SO There.
Today has been about as uneventful as a day can get, even for me.
The major excitement came in the form of roughly twenty minutes spent out in the world grocery shopping.
From there, I came home, had lunch, and went for a walk.
After that the next major event involved separating a “family pack” of boneless, skinless chicken breasts into Jon size portions and freezing them for future use.
That was a thrill ride. It just doesn’t get any better than that.
Seriously. It does not get better.
I spent a little time trying to draw, but well into the picture I realized that it wasn’t working out right and that even if it did work out right it still wouldn’t be especially good.
Last night we got some much needed rain in the form of a pretty strong thunderstorm.
Unfortunately, the cold front that brought the rain we needed brought cooler temperatures, so today was not nearly so nice as yesterday (prior to the storm, at least) had been.
Honestly, I have to say that I’ve got nothing. There are things that I could be writing about, but I just don’t feel up to it, so I might as well just call it quits for this entry.
The major excitement came in the form of roughly twenty minutes spent out in the world grocery shopping.
From there, I came home, had lunch, and went for a walk.
After that the next major event involved separating a “family pack” of boneless, skinless chicken breasts into Jon size portions and freezing them for future use.
That was a thrill ride. It just doesn’t get any better than that.
Seriously. It does not get better.
I spent a little time trying to draw, but well into the picture I realized that it wasn’t working out right and that even if it did work out right it still wouldn’t be especially good.
Last night we got some much needed rain in the form of a pretty strong thunderstorm.
Unfortunately, the cold front that brought the rain we needed brought cooler temperatures, so today was not nearly so nice as yesterday (prior to the storm, at least) had been.
Honestly, I have to say that I’ve got nothing. There are things that I could be writing about, but I just don’t feel up to it, so I might as well just call it quits for this entry.
Monday, April 03, 2006
It's About Time
For some reason this morning I found myself thinking that it takes me the same amount of time to get to Ashburn as it does to get to Reston, so I headed out for my dentist appointment a half an hour before I needed to be there, which meant that I arrived about twenty minutes early.
To pass some of the time I stopped at the nearby Giant to get some cash out of the ATM. While I was there I stopped by the magazine rack to kill a little time.
I was pleased to discover that one of the bozos at the various men’s magazines – FHM, in this case – finally borrowed a brain and set up a photo shoot featuring Erica Durance, who plays Lois Lane on Smallville.
This is something that should have happened two years ago and should have been a no-brainer.
Ah well, better late than never, I guess. As I haven’t noticed anyone posting the scans online, I opted to pick up a copy for myself for scanning, and I’m sure you’ll see at least one of my renderings of her one of these days.
I would say without hesitation – and have done so on many occasions – that Durance (It’s pronounced “Duransee,” with a hard “e.” …okay, I can’t not say it: I’ve got a “hard e” for her.), is the best Lois Lane ever. It’s possible that Kate Bosworth will do a better job this summer, I suppose, but as I won’t be going to see that travesty of a movie, I guess I’ll never know.
(Speaking of LL, I am still thinking about the whole Ideal Queen of Perfection thing)
I was pleased to see that in addition to featuring her inside the magazine proper, Durance was included in the “100 Sexiest Women in the World 2006” supplement at Number 38 (which is a full eight places ahead of Kristin Kreuk, who plays Lana Lang).
Considering that it was her first appearance on the list, I’d say that’s a respectable placement.
Once I got to the dentist I learned that the hygienist, an Iranian woman, is looking for a new therapist (her current therapist is a woman who is a size 0 who makes her feel that much more self-conscious about her struggles with her weight), Iranians celebrate the New Year, which on their calendar begins on the first day of Spring, for 13 days, and that I’ve been wearing my partials too much, as they make my gums, which, she said, are “usually beautiful,” red and swollen.
She’s a nice lady (I can’t help but like a woman who frequently calls me “my dear” and compliments me on my gums), but she’s extremely chatty.
From the dentist I went to McDonald’s for lunch, then hit Wal-Mart to pick up a new home phone, as the battery in the one I have now lasts less than a half an hour. I suppose I could have just gotten a new battery for it, but that seemed silly given that I only paid like nine bucks for the thing in the first place.
I’d grabbed it because it was 900 MHz and wouldn’t interfere with my router.
This time I decided to go with a 5.8 GHz phone, and further that I’d get one with dual handsets.
From there I went to the theater, where I was meeting Brian to see Slither.
Great movie. Extremely gory, but also extremely funny.
Imagine a Troma style movie made with a real budget, decent actors, and a good script (I do realize that the notion of a good Troma movie is a contradiction in terms), and you’ll have an idea of what the movie was like.
(Troma Studios co-founder Lloyd Kaufman actually has a cameo role in the movie, and in one scene a character is watching The Toxic Avenger on TV)
As I said, it’s gross, but if you can take the gore, and if you like to be made to squirm just as much as you like to be made to jump, go see this movie.
Elizabeth Banks, whom I’ve liked since I first saw her bringing Betty Brant to life in Spider-Man, was great, as was Nathan Fillion, whom I know was the lead in Firefly and Serenity, though I still haven’t gotten around to seeing them.
My one complaint about the movie is that Jenna Fischer of The Office was under-utilized, but the scenes she was in were very entertaining.
Oh yeah, I have one other complaint: no boobs.
No movie is perfect, I guess, but it wouldn’t have bothered me as much if it weren’t for the number of times there were almost boobs.
Ah well.
In any case, that will do it for now. I’m sure I’ll be back with more later, but if not, there’s always tomorrow.
To pass some of the time I stopped at the nearby Giant to get some cash out of the ATM. While I was there I stopped by the magazine rack to kill a little time.
I was pleased to discover that one of the bozos at the various men’s magazines – FHM, in this case – finally borrowed a brain and set up a photo shoot featuring Erica Durance, who plays Lois Lane on Smallville.
This is something that should have happened two years ago and should have been a no-brainer.
Ah well, better late than never, I guess. As I haven’t noticed anyone posting the scans online, I opted to pick up a copy for myself for scanning, and I’m sure you’ll see at least one of my renderings of her one of these days.
I would say without hesitation – and have done so on many occasions – that Durance (It’s pronounced “Duransee,” with a hard “e.” …okay, I can’t not say it: I’ve got a “hard e” for her.), is the best Lois Lane ever. It’s possible that Kate Bosworth will do a better job this summer, I suppose, but as I won’t be going to see that travesty of a movie, I guess I’ll never know.
(Speaking of LL, I am still thinking about the whole Ideal Queen of Perfection thing)
I was pleased to see that in addition to featuring her inside the magazine proper, Durance was included in the “100 Sexiest Women in the World 2006” supplement at Number 38 (which is a full eight places ahead of Kristin Kreuk, who plays Lana Lang).
Considering that it was her first appearance on the list, I’d say that’s a respectable placement.
Once I got to the dentist I learned that the hygienist, an Iranian woman, is looking for a new therapist (her current therapist is a woman who is a size 0 who makes her feel that much more self-conscious about her struggles with her weight), Iranians celebrate the New Year, which on their calendar begins on the first day of Spring, for 13 days, and that I’ve been wearing my partials too much, as they make my gums, which, she said, are “usually beautiful,” red and swollen.
She’s a nice lady (I can’t help but like a woman who frequently calls me “my dear” and compliments me on my gums), but she’s extremely chatty.
From the dentist I went to McDonald’s for lunch, then hit Wal-Mart to pick up a new home phone, as the battery in the one I have now lasts less than a half an hour. I suppose I could have just gotten a new battery for it, but that seemed silly given that I only paid like nine bucks for the thing in the first place.
I’d grabbed it because it was 900 MHz and wouldn’t interfere with my router.
This time I decided to go with a 5.8 GHz phone, and further that I’d get one with dual handsets.
From there I went to the theater, where I was meeting Brian to see Slither.
Great movie. Extremely gory, but also extremely funny.
Imagine a Troma style movie made with a real budget, decent actors, and a good script (I do realize that the notion of a good Troma movie is a contradiction in terms), and you’ll have an idea of what the movie was like.
(Troma Studios co-founder Lloyd Kaufman actually has a cameo role in the movie, and in one scene a character is watching The Toxic Avenger on TV)
As I said, it’s gross, but if you can take the gore, and if you like to be made to squirm just as much as you like to be made to jump, go see this movie.
Elizabeth Banks, whom I’ve liked since I first saw her bringing Betty Brant to life in Spider-Man, was great, as was Nathan Fillion, whom I know was the lead in Firefly and Serenity, though I still haven’t gotten around to seeing them.
My one complaint about the movie is that Jenna Fischer of The Office was under-utilized, but the scenes she was in were very entertaining.
Oh yeah, I have one other complaint: no boobs.
No movie is perfect, I guess, but it wouldn’t have bothered me as much if it weren’t for the number of times there were almost boobs.
Ah well.
In any case, that will do it for now. I’m sure I’ll be back with more later, but if not, there’s always tomorrow.
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