Living In The Shadow Of Adam West

I woke up sometime early this morning – it was still dark out – and thought that I should roll over and look at the time, figuring that it was, as had been the case all week when I found myself in the same situation, probably five to eight minutes before my alarm was going to go off. Then I remembered that it was Saturday and promptly went back to sleep.
I ended up getting up sometime around 9:30, at which point I sat around and did nothing in particular for about 45 minutes before deciding that I should shower, dress, and head out into the world. I ended up sitting around doing nothing in particular for an additional 45 minutes.
The new cell phone I’m planning to buy was released on Tuesday, so I decided I was going to head to an AT&T store to see if it was available. In particular, I decided to go to the one at the Dulles Town Center, as I had a yen for the bourbon chicken they sell at the food court and I wanted to swing by Wal-Mart as well.
I decided that I wasn’t going to take 7 to get there, deciding instead to take the reverse of the route I usually take home from work, which meant driving through Ashburn. Once I got to Ashburn I noticed that I was low on gas, so I went to the Safeway, as with the Safeway Club Card discount gas is usually cheaper there. While I was filling up the car, the Universe decided that it wasn’t going to be stymied in its efforts to drench me with rain by the fact that I was covered overhead, so the wind whipped up and the rain went horizontal.
However, I noticed that there was an AT&T store in that plaza, so I decided I would just go there and forego the trip to the Town Center and Wal-Mart.
The AT&T store was closed when I got to it, though, and I’m assuming that it’s permanently closed, as it looked pretty abandoned.
So it was back in the car and off to the Town Center, which was positively teeming with people. They’re already doing the whole picture with Santa thing.
Making quick work of my lunch so as to get away from the filled to overflowing food court as soon as possible, I headed to the AT&T store, which, despite actually being open, looked just as abandoned as the one in Ashburn.
They didn’t have the phone, and, having no other reason to linger, I left the Town Center and headed to Best Buy to see if they had the phone or some other shiny piece of gadgetry that I could waste money on. They didn’t have either, so I went to Wal-Mart, which was even more congested than it was last Sunday.
I thought the whole economy thing meant that people don’t have any money and as a result wouldn’t be out shopping. Other peoples’ loss is supposed to be my gain in this regard, so what’s the deal?
I suppose that’s what I get for living in one of the wealthiest counties in the country.
Deciding I couldn’t take it any longer, I took off, planning to head to Super Target in Leesburg to do my grocery shopping, figuring that it probably wouldn’t be as crowded.
Along the way, though, I decided that I just wanted to go home. Still, I did need some groceries just to get through the night, so I stopped at the Shoppers in Ashburn and bought milk and bread, deciding that I really didn’t absolutely need anything else.
At different points during this overcast but fairly warm day it’s been slightly rainy, very rainy, almost sunny, and positively nasty. It decided to go the positively nasty route as I walked back to my car, and remained so for the duration of my drive home.
Once I got home, I couldn’t think of anything finer to do with my time than to take a nap, so that’s what I did.
My real world aggravation and agitation decided to follow me into the dream world, so while I slept I had a bunch of stressful dreams in which really irritating things happened. As an example, at one point I dreamed that I was driving somewhere, though I had no idea where I was headed. Deciding that wherever it was I wanted to go was in the opposite direction, I made a sharp turn into a parking lot so that I could turn around. As I tried to get back on the road, though, I found that I couldn’t shift gears and was stuck partway on the road, unable to move.
But now I’m awake – though I still feel like I’m stuck in neutral – writing this, and trying to figure out how I’m going to feed myself with just bread and milk.
Last night was largely spent dozing on the couch and watching a bunch of TV – both recorded and live.
Among the shows I watched was the new Batman cartoon on Cartoon Network, Batman: The Brave and the Bold.
The basic premise of the show is that each week Batman will team up with some other hero – or maybe even villain – from the DC Universe’s stable of characters.
Like the current Brave and the Bold comic series, the cartoon takes its name from an long-running comic.
In its earliest days B&B was simply an anthology series, featuring stories about characters like The Silent Knight, The Viking Prince, and the Suicide Squad. In fact, the Justice League of America had its debut in the pages of B&B.
However, somewhere along the line it became a team-up book, that, like the cartoon, featured Batman paired with other – usually lesser-known – DC characters.
When I was a kid, team-up books were fairly popular. In addition to B&B, DC published DC Comics Presents, which featured Superman teaming up with a different guest star every month.
On the Marvel side, there was Marvel Team-Up, which paired Spider-Man with a rotating stable of guest stars, and Marvel Two-In-One, which did the same with The Thing.
(Marvel can be forgiven for calling a book Marvel Two-In-One, as in those days porn was not nearly so ingrained into our culture.)
The current B&B comic doesn’t limit itself to Batman and..., but has an ever-changing lne-up, with pairings such as Superman and Catwoman, or Green Arrow and Deadman.
Anyway, to get back to the cartoon, as has been the trend in recent animated series based on comics, the target audience is very young children, so it’s much goofier and more light-hearted than, say, Batman: The Animated Series, or Justice League Unlimited.
However, it was not as cutesy and insultingly goofy as that abominable Teen Titans series from a few years back.
Overall the episode, despite being geared towards such a young audience, was entertaining, and at least it doesn’t go the anime route in terms of style, which is always a plus.
I was also intrigued by some of the familiar faces displayed in the opening title sequence, as it seems likely that at some point they’ll be appearing on the show to team up with Batman. I can’t help but think that, no matter the circumstances, it would be cool to see an animated version of Kamandi, the Last Boy, for example.
I’ll probably watch a few more episodes to see if it hooks me, so clearly it wasn’t as utterly off-putting as the aforementioned Teen Titans, the recently-canceled Legion cartoon, or - *sigh* - Krypto the Super-Dog.
While I’m not bothered by the light-hearted approach, I can’t help but wonder why that’s such a trend lately. I mean, what would be so wrong with doing a more straightforward and serious approach geared toward a slightly older audience?
Also, as I watched it I couldn’t help but think that despite the success of The Dark Knight, the character of Batman will never be able to get out from under the campy shadow of Adam West. The campy, pudgy shadow of Adam West.
(I will concede that he is awesome on Family Guy, though.)
Anyway, I suppose that’s more than enough to write about a kids’ cartoon.
I’m not sure what I’m going to do with what remains of my evening. I still need to eat something, but that probably won’t take long.
Maybe I’ll watch some of the R-rated Riff Trax movies that Scott can’t watch.

I Ain't Got Time To Jack Around. I Mean, I Do That; I Make Time.

Want to be a hero? Here's your chance to do so without having to be bitten by a radioactive spider or to pay me to draw you as one.
Adult Swim is currently holding a casting call for the role of Carl in a live-action episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force.
The friggin' sweet details of this casting Carl...er...call can be found here.
What's that you say? Carl isn't a hero?
That's where you're wrong, because Carl is my hero.
After all, he don't need no instructions to know how to rock. Especially when he breaks out his bad-ass red jeans.
Widdly-widdly-widdly-widdly-waaaaaahhhhh....

Get Your Priorities Straight

Here's the problem with the world; people aren't focusing on What Really Matters In Life

(Found via Reddit. Oh, and the graph on the previous post was found via Scott.)

Oh, and happy belated birthday to Kevin and Joel, whose shared birthday was yesterday.

Dyslexic Evangelicals

more music charts

The Remaining Gap Or Can't Someone Else Do It?

I was supposed to have an eye appointment this evening, but it had to be rescheduled for next week.
However, the appointment reminded me of the fact that when I made my “filling in the gaps” post a while back, there was one that I missed.
(Note that you didn’t miss anything as a result of my lack of posting yesterday. I worked, came home, dozed on the couch, watched TV, went to bed. Exciting stuff.)
In any case, on the day before Halloween I woke up in a bad mood, for no particular reason that I could identify. It was just a lousy, under a black cloud, hate world…revenge soon kind of day.
I told Scott, “I don’t want to do this anymore,” and went on to explain that by “this” I meant all of it: everything that’s involved in being Jon.
I had decided that 36 years of being Jon was long enough and that it was time to retire and let someone else do it. Meanwhile, I could start being Dave, or Steve, or anyone other than Jon.
Of course this wasn’t really an option, and realizing and understanding this fact made my mood even darker.
I wasn’t sure what time my eye appointment was, so I called the office to confirm, and ended up sitting on hold for an extended period of time.
Because I was still Jon, I was, of course, gracious and understanding about the whole hold time thing and said that it wasn’t a problem.
I’d put off going to the comic shop on Wednesday so that I could stop by there on Thursday, stop somewhere to get something to eat after that, and then go straight to my appointment.
Naturally I ended up getting stuck at work later than usual, so after stopping at the comic shop I really didn’t have enough time go figure out where I wanted to eat, go there, eat, and make it to my appointment on time.
So I skipped the eating part, which meant that I still ended up getting to the eye doctor’s early, getting progressively more pissed off about the nature of my Jon-ness and my inability to escape it.
I sat in the car for a little while sifting through my CDs to find one to replace what was currently in the CD player, and while I did so, some lady and her kids pulled up nearby. They got out of their car and one of the kids was blathering on about something, which prompted me to angrily mock him as I sat there.
I got out of my car and spotted a Lexus SUV, parked diagonally across four parking spaces, noted the “McCain/Palin” and “I [Heart] Palin” bumper stickers, and also the presence of a yappy little dog inside and found myself hating the world that much more.
To kill a few more minutes I went into the far too busy Giant to pick up a couple of things, brought them back to my car – yappy dog still yapping – and then decided that it was close enough and went into the eye doctor’s office.
I did take heart in noting that the lady and her kids, who, after my unnoticed mocking, had gone into the eye doctor’s office themselves, were leaving, so I wouldn’t have to put up with them and fight my urge to make fun of the kid’s high-pitched pre-pubescent voice while inside.
Once I went in I was greeted by the girl I’d talked to on the phone earlier, who once again apologized profusely about the hold time, and when I said once again that it wasn’t a problem, she said to one of the other girls working there, “He’s just the nicest person.”
I thought, “If you’d seen me in my car ten minutes ago, or were privy to the thoughts I had while I was in Giant, I think your assessment would be a bit different.”
At this point I need to go off on a bit of an aside. Years ago, when I lived in Ashburn and went to the office location there for all of my eye-related needs, I semi-successfully asked out the extremely attractive office manager who worked there. It was semi-successful in that we ended up going on two dates, but ultimately – and frustratingly – nothing really came of it.
The end result aside, the actual act of asking her out had been kind of an irritating and humiliating experience. I’d gone in for my appointment with the intention of asking her out, but my nerve failed me, and I left without following through on my plan. However, once I got to my car I smoked a cigarette, steeled myself, turned around and walked back towards the office. When I got there, I saw that she was at the desk alone, so, coasting on adrenaline, I burst in and headed towards her. Seeing me, she looked up, and concerned that there might be a problem, asked if something was wrong.
Before I could utter a word, another patient came in. I sighed and decided that total privacy was unobtainable, and started to make my pitch, just as the eye doctor – the owner/senior partner – came back up front to ask her about something.
So he ended up being there to observe the whole nervous mess.
Since I’ve been doing the gentle molding thing, I’ve been treated by one of the associates/partners, who is a pleasant enough woman, which has been good, because, while I recognize that the chances of him remembering that debacle – or at least that I was the person involved in it – are almost nil, I can’t help feeling uncomfortable around the practice’s titular doctor.
Naturally I ended up getting examined by him, which annoyed me, as did the realization that the whole “Ashburn Incident” was five goddamn years ago already.
This was annoying because a. how did five years go by so quickly? b. can’t I just forget about that nonsense already? and c. I really haven’t had a date since that time? *Sigh*
Still, I fought down all of the day’s annoyances and my black mood and stayed “in character” through the whole thing, which took a lot of effort and made me tired. Noticeably so, apparently, as the doctor suggested that after the exam I should go home and get some rest.
On my previous check-ups I haven’t been given any instructions as to how many nights I should have worn my lenses before going in, and this appointment happened to fall on the day after my night off. The doctor requested that I come back after having worn the lenses for a full four nights.
He also mentioned that, while it had been cleared away by my watering eyes in the course of the examination, I apparently have some sort of mucus build-up on my eyelids that can interfere with the production of tears (another fun part of being Jon: the grossness just doesn’t quit), and a good tear layer is essential to the gentle molding process, so he also wanted me to come back to have that checked out, and, if necessary, have my eyelids scrubbed, which just sounds like it’ll be a blast.
This is why I had an appointment for tonight, which has, as mentioned, been rescheduled for next week.
In any case, that fills the remaining gap.
For the curious among you, I woke up feeling considerably less hateful and desirous of retiring from the job of being myself the next morning.
Oh, and the Lexus and the yappy little dog were still there when I got out of my appointment more than a half an hour later.
As for today, it’s been much like yesterday, with the notable exception of my writing this entry.
Tomorrow night is, of course, Riff Trax night, though we’ll most likely start off the evening by watching Hellboy 2 on Blu-ray…after I stop by Target and buy it, at any rate.
Thursday is too much TV night, so you likely won’t be seeing any sort of substantive entries before Frida.

Black Sunday?

I ventured out into the world this afternoon, knowing that, as is the case on most Sundays, any place I went to would be filled to overflowing.
So I thought I was prepared, but it turned out that I was wrong.
I'd gone out because there were a few things that I'd forgotten to pick up yesterday, and, for whatever reason, I decided to get those things from Wal-Mart.
As soon as I got to the parking lot I realized my mistake, ending up parking about as far away from the store as it's possible to do and still, technically, be in its parking lot.
Once I got inside it was like Black Friday. Everywhere I looked there were people and empty shelves.
It was crazy.
Was there some special significance to today? Some amazing sales going on?
Oddly enough, I didn't have to spend a lot of time in line, as, for the first time in my experience in almost six years, they actually had an adequate number of registers open.
That was almost weirder than the truly insane number of customers in the store.
Then again, I ended up going through a line that was being worked by this older woman on what appeared to be her first day.
I don't just mean her first day at the register, I mean her first day, period.
She seemed genuinely puzzled by every aspect of not only her job but of life, as though she had just sprung into existence with a full adult intellect and education, but no actual experience with life.
It was almost more fascinating than irritating.
Almost.

I'm A Donor

A Reason to be an Organ Donor

(Found via Reddit}