[Back] [Bottom] [Index] [List] [View] [Calendar] [Friends] [Bio]

Friends of demona.

Who: E!
Date: 2010-03-06 23:02:04
Subject: Nearly a year
Entry: No updates in nearly a year, WOO!

Although, in all seriousness, it is sort of nice to know that this still actually works.  Amazing what good code can tolerate.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2009-03-12 10:09:53
Subject: Sick
Entry: Day two and a half of being sick.  No sir, I don't like it.  I had to cut out of work at 3pm on Tuesday, emailed in sick yesterday, and again today.  I started coughing around noon yesterday.  Still coughing a bit today and my nose has been stuffed up since yesterday evening.  Ugh.

I've updated the XAJAX library for the site as well since I have a little time on my hands.  Next I'm going to start working on my taxes once I've checked my work email.  Yay fun.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2008-06-14 22:36:57
Subject: Bubba Paris
Entry: We had to go to Walmart this afternoon after we got back from dog training.  While there we met Bubba Paris, #77 of the 49 Niners.  He was selling autographed photos, hats, and footballs.  $20 for an autographed photo which Bridget plans to give to her dad tomoorow for father's day.  Her dad is a fan of the '9ers so this was some pretty good timing, even though I had to secret it out of the store, etc., since he was in the store doing his shopping.  Bubba seemed to be a very approchable guy.  Very friendly.  In between chatting with people he was eating some chicken wings from the food court area.

I have a good reason to go buy a new lense for my camera but am having trouble finding one which meets my criteria.  Tomorrow I shall search for one in earnest!  I've been wanting a 28, 30, or 35mm lense, full frame (not cropped for digital), and f1.4.  It's the f1.4 part which is making this difficult and expensive.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2008-05-30 18:03:49
Subject: Interns are sometimes funny
Entry: I had to go out to one of our other offices this morning to do a bit of inventory work.  Fun stuff, I'll tell you.  Most of the people at this location are interns and most of them young - in their early 20's.

While at one of the desks for one of the women, I noticed that she had one of the door nameplates sitting on top of the monitor stand.  Covering her last name was a label from one of those electric label makers.  COCK LOVER.  Oh yeah.  Classy.  Done as a practical joke or in some amount of seriousness?

A while later I was at another desk where on the post-board next to it was one of those "Be nice to me because I gave blood today!"  Only someone had put correction tape over the BLOO and written HEA on it.  Yes, it now says, "Be nice to me because I gave head today!"  This was another womans desk.  I can easily imagine this one as having been done during the tenure of a previous set of interns and just either never noticed or left alone for the humor of it.

I wonder if I were to walk around there actually looking for such things if I'd find more.  Seems likely.

Well, that was the high-light of my day.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2008-02-05 19:07:29
Subject: Super Fat Tuesday
Entry: I just got back from performing one of my civic duties - I voted.  The last time I tried to perform one of my civic duties, namely Jury Duty, I was told that I couldn't because of where I work.  Well, not told that I couldn't so much as excluding from being able to in that case.  But I tried.

I had to choose the lessor of two evils:  My hope is that Clinton will lose the nomination since I can't stand her one bit.  I don't care for Obama either, but he hasn't done anything in particular to piss me off ... yet.
I voted No on everything (91, 92, and 93) except the Indian gaming propositions (94, 95, 96, and 97).

It'll be vaguely interesting to see how this day of mass primary votes pans out in the morning.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2007-07-07 19:03:50
Subject: Thoughts on the iPhone
Entry:
No, I don't own an iPhone.  Yes, I have played with one and not just in the store.  I have no plans to at this moment, either.  If it wasn't for the price tag alone, or having bought a new phone a few months ago, there's still plenty of reasons for me not to buy one.  In fact, to kick this off...

Reasons why I am not interested in an iPhone

  • $500 (or $600) and no discounts whatsoever.  Jesus.  I can get over that easily considering what the phone can do, though.
  • EDGE only, no 3G network connectivity.  Apple claims that the reason they don't support 3G is because the chipset is too large (wtf!) and that it'd drain the battery quickly (ok, that's valid).
  • No MMS support.  This one is a huge WTF!  Every single modern phone out there has supported MMS.  This is how most people send out their crappy pictures, etc., so this one is a signifigant point of confusion.  Even the crappy phones they give away and completely suck do MMS.  Way to go, Steve, you dumbass.
  • Can't stream music over BlueTooth.  This is understandable, really, considering it has a normal 1/8" headphone jack.
  • Can't tether a laptop to the phone via BlueTooth for internet/data access.  This isn't a deal killer, but it might as well be since it's a feature I plan to use heavily for work when traveling.
  • If you ever discontinue your service your phone becomes a paper-weight.  You won't even be able to use the iPod portion of it seperately.  Extreme lameness.
  • Can't add your own ringtones.  This would merely be a "nice to have" for me.
The EDGE and no tethering kill it for me more than anything else.

Things that I do like

  • That touch-screen.  That's pretty sweet.
  • A real web browser.  I'm envious of a phone that has a real web browser in it as the one in my Blackjack is pretty lame.  It works, sure, but it really missed the mark.  The Safari browser on the iPhone?  A damn fine browser, indeed.
  • 802.11 connectivity.  This means nice, fast web access at home and at other covered locations.

What I would like to see

  • 3G.  If it'll be such a burden on my battery, give me a preference setting and a way to toggle between EDGE and 3G.
  • Data tethering.
  • MMS
  • A normal mini-USB connection slot in addition to the normal Apple connector so I can use it without dragging the cable with me everywhere I go (work, buddies house) so I can use it as a flash drive.
  • To be able to set what apps are on the main menu and their order.  The stock ticker is nice, but I don't need it on the main menu.
  • Double-tap on phone numbers in the contact list to dial instead of single-tap.  Make this an option somewhere.
  • Removable battery.  It might be nice if I could carry a second charged battery and quickly swap them in the middle of the day while traveling or just doing too much business stuff.
  • Black back of the case.  This would just look cooler.  My phones are not fashion statements, but I do want them to look cool in a minimalistic way.  The iPhone is pretty much there on this front, but the back needs to be entirely black to get all the way there.

Conclusion

Apple has made a good phone, but they made some pretty stupid mistakes with it.  They've probably already figured out that the next gen. needs to basically add in everything they left out that I mentioned above.  Plenty of people have bitched about it directly to Apple during the first week alone.  And there you have it.  I'll wait and see what the 2nd gen. iPhone shapes up to be, if there even is one.

I'm also waiting for the 6th gen. iPod to come out and to see what we're doing at work for our next round of cell phones.  Right now I have some cheasy Nokia which has an FM radio built in to it.  I use that FM radio just about every morning now, so I'll miss it if we switch to something w/o one.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2007-07-03 19:44:48
Subject: Peoples return!
Entry: My friend Sara ("Micha" here) is back in town for the next couple of months from her trip to Japan before moving way back east for more college.  Yay!  Too bad it'll be somewhat difficult to come up with matching schedules in order to hang out a bit.  Foop.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2007-05-15 06:06:45
Subject: Gas boycott? Foolishness!
Entry: Apparently today is another of those foolish gasoline boycott days.  Every time I hear someone say, "we're going to boycott buying gas for one day to send a message!" I cannot help buy say to myself about them, "you poor, simple, idiot."

I say foolish because it doesn't work.  It doesn't do a damn thing.  If you don't buy your gas today, you'll either buy it tomorrow or you bought it yesterday.  And not only that, but it'll make zero difference to the "bottom line" of "big oil" because that gas that is at the Shell or Chevron down the street?  Shell and Chevron don't own those locations - they're often a franchise.  What that means is that the location bought the gas they're trying to sell you.  This is, in part, why one Shell, Chevron, Union 76, etc. will have different prices a mere mile apart from another of the same branded location.

Now, if people really wanted to "send a message" they'd ride their bikes, carpool, use the local regional transit buses and/or trains.  By carpooling a group of people can pay a little for the gas of one vehicle.  By only driving your car a couple miles to the local regional transit station for the buses and/or trains , not only will you reduce pollution a bit but you'll save money on gas.

"The government needs to investigate this and fine big oil!"  Fine them?  No.  Investigate why the cost of gas has doubled in the past twenty years?  Sure, why not.  But it's not the answer.  If you want the government to do anything about the cost of gas, you should be wanting it to fund research in to alternative fuels such as bio-diesel and other forms.  The buses in my area use Natural gas which burns cleanly (or, at least, that is what everyone says) and probbaly doesn't cost nearly as much as gasoline.  If it did, the cost of bus far would be insane.

Blah.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2007-04-28 01:29:32
Subject: who knows?
Entry: Wow, I've been putting off so many good enteries lately it's not even close to funny.  Serious procrastination has been at work, here.  Although right now I've just fixed the MagickWand extension for the web server, so that's good.  Plus some other apps and libs have been finally upgraded.

I can't decide if I want to refill my cup with more rum&coke or just, you know, go to bed like I should.  Hrm.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2007-03-18 16:56:32
Subject: Clothes shopping
Entry:
I just got back from spending $365 on clothes.  Four shirts, two Levis 501, two Dockers slacks, two cargo shorts, twelve pairs of socks (give or take since it was buy two get one free), and twelve pairs of underwear.  Something makes me think something wasn't added up correctly.  Perhaps I should check that out, hmm.

I've never been a fan of clothes shopping.  Even less of shopping for underwear - you walk down the isle and all these packages (of underwear) with half naked guys on them with their shorts stuff are staring back at you.  Never has seemed like an encouraging thing to me.  Jeans I can do just fine.  I know my size and style.  It's all good.  Shirts aren't much of a problem either.  Still, it's the whole ordeal I've never enjoyed.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2007-03-03 08:18:32
Subject:
Entry:
I haven't made any updates in forever, it seems.  Since November, actually.  Though I've meant to, honest, but I just haven't made the time.  Maybe I'll go back and fill in some of the blanks.  Probably not.

Updates on life:
  • The American Bulldog puppy we got months ago, who we named Vala, is doing great.  She's about 5 months old now, and weighs in at roughly 40lbs.  She's still super cute, though acts like a butt every once in a while.
  • A month or so ago we rescued (for lack of a better term) one of Vala's sisters.  She too is doing well, is super cute, and weighs roughly 40lbs.  She is generally quite cuddly, and likes to stir up the other dogs.  Her paws are huge.  She's going to be a big dog.
  • My Motorola RAZR V3's keypad took a dump on me a month or so ago.  So now I have a Samsung Blackjack.  I've been abusing the hell out of the $40 unlimited data plan.  I like it quite a lot, though it has some bugs and I'm not 100% sold on it.  It has a few annoying features.  If it had a normal mini-USB port on it, I'd be 100% sold.  That's my number one complaint, and the bugs being number two.
So, err, yeah.  I'm going to need to make a fancy-less smartphone compatible version of this diary site now though since I cannot add or edit entries from the phone.  I still need to work on the picture attachment part for entries too, I suppose.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-11-25 10:30:34
Subject:
Entry: The puppy is still peeing where ever she feels like it unless we catch her before she begins.  She getting a bit better about that, though.  After she's been sleeping for a bit and starts to get up, we take her to the pee-pad and she does her thing.  Then we praise her, because that's what you've got to do to make them begin to think, "oh, hey, they like it when I do this here."  Or so says common wisdom.  I don't quite fully see it just yet.

My sickness, which is surely a result of the wisdom teeth extractions, comes and goes.  And only my right nostril get plugged up or runny.  As long as I haven't waited to long before taking my next dose of Advil, things are pretty good.  And yeah, Thursday I was able to eat a full Turkey Day meal for lunch we the group of us went out for that.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-11-23 05:05:24
Subject: New puppy!
Entry: Bridget brought the new puppy home with her on her way home from work yesterday thereby surprising me when she got home.  I was really looking forward to being there when we picked her up, but hey, that's ok.

I got up to go to the bathroom at 4am this morning while Bridget was supervising the puppy while it did its potty thing on some special potty pads meant to help train dogs to not pee where ever they feel like it.  So far those aren't working out so well, but we've gotten some positive results so far.  As soon as I came out of the bathroom I discovered the awful stench of Puppy Poop(TM) and was drafted to clean up the mess.  The puppy peed on the pad properly, but missed the mark a bit for mostly liquid, and quite stenchy, poop.

It's going to be an adventure.

So anyway, yeah, we got some pretty good pictures of the puppy yesterday.  She seemed to be unsure of her new home for a bit (as one would expect), but seems to have gotten ok with it enough now that we just need to house break her and things will be good.  She likes to chew on things, esp. your fingers, the rug, and the tag on Electra's bed.

The upper right side of my mouth where the wisdom teeth were extracted is giving me some grief, esp. the upper area.  And my right ear aches.  Both of these complaints of mine are considered a normal side effect.  I agree with the bone/tooth ache considering, but the ear ache part is driving me nuts.  A few more days and that should go away.  Anyway, there's the updates and I've consumed my Advil.  It's tome to go back to bed.  VMWare Server is still being a bitch on the laptop.  Grr.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-11-17 17:59:29
Subject: No more wisdom teeth!
Entry: This morning I had my wisdom teeth removed finally.  When they looked at the x-ray a couple of weeks ago everyone commented on how big those teeth were.  I never really thought about that until.  Yeah, the erupted one was large and would leave a big hole.  It's sort of weird to poke the area with my tongue (gently as I don't wish to disturb the clotting), but I'm totally ok with that - that problem child is gone and won't be causing any more trouble ever again.

Sadly I didn't remember to ask them to save the teeth so I could see them even though they would sure come out in many pieces.  Afterwards when I asked about them they printed out a copy of the x-rays for me, though, so that was very cool of them since I never attempted to scan/photograph them myself.
The process itself apparently went without a hitch, and I'm doing very well with the minorest amount of discomfort.  I'm told and have read that the real pain will begin tomorrow or the day after lasting a couple days.  We'll see.  So far the worst it has been was for the couple of hours after waking up, most of that time while waiting at Kaiser for my pain prescription for when i need it in a couple days.

The woman at the counter at Kaiser said she'd put a rush on filling my order without being asked or my ever even really saying a word.  If that filling was a rush job, wow, I think that was a phrase she used to just try and make us think they cared.  It was about 30-45 minutes of waiting, and the prescription had been called in about 45-60 minutes earlier.  Annoying, but not horrible.  At least I wasn't in dire need or anything...

I sat in the chair at the office and they hooked me up the a blood pressure and heart-rate machine, and three probes, then put on a big bib on me.  After a short bit they put in the intravenous line with only saline at the time.  I honestly don't remember if they gas me any nitrous through one of those nose setups, but they did say they were going to give me something to relax with.  I didn't need anything as I was pretty relaxed already, but hey, why not?  I believe they gave me a sedative via the line though.  I just totally didn't pay attention to this part at all.  A minute later I started to giggle a little for a very short period of time as I could feel what I assumed was the sedative.

At this point I don't remember anything at all.  Nothing.  No questions, no asking being asked to count... nothing until everything was over and I had gauze stuffed in both sides of my mouth.  At this point I then got up with minimal difficulty and walked to the waiting/observation area.  Thirty or so minutes later we were out of there after having been told where the prescription had been called and a reminder or what to do for the rest of the day.

You know what sucks the most so far?  Not having a second hand to use (because it is holding a bag of ice) to play with my practically still brand new Xbox 360 that I bought last weekend and have only played for a total of one and a half hours so far.  Oh, and typing single-handedly, too.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-11-12 10:30:35
Subject: New entry editor is online
Entry: I'm pleased to announce the arrival of the latest version of the entry editor.  It uses AJAX technology in order to make repeated updates to an entry much faster than ever before since you are no longer waiting on an entire page to load.  Additionally this is one features a somewhat cleaner and easier to quickly navigate interface where everything is clearly grouped.  Also, the user pic selector is kind of cool and a long-awaited feature that I just never got around to finishing until now.  The Preview option is back to being a radio button along with the Save option.  Previews can be accessed either through the Preview option and clicking on Submit, or by clicking on the Preview button in the FCKeditor toolbar.

As usual, if you find any bugs or have question/suggestions let me know.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-11-10 16:51:37
Subject: Nothing important, really
Entry: Today I was thinking I'd clear the yard of leaves, but it was a bit too chilly for me to want to get started on that until later.  So in the meantime I started working on more of the diary site code.  I've made quite a few little improvements, etc., but as far as the leaves go, well, they're still on the ground.  I'll need to fix that early tomorrow morning or Sunday.

Now, for the diary code, well, that's something else.  I've finally replaced the image resize code to work now that I don't have the PECL Imagick stuff anymore.  Instead I'm using the PHP MagickWand code now.  Hopefully they'll keep that relatively updated so I don't go through yet another change in the image code.  Once that was done I started looking at the user avatar/icon code again since I've completely forgotten what how I was cobbling that together before.  So now the development entry editor seems to be fully functional in that regard and it takes up 100% of the window now instead of a fixed size.

The recent entry list also displays the icons used next to each entry as well.  People who look at my list of icons will probably notice there are more than five which is the limit for normal accounts.  I think I might implement user classes at some point which will act as a kind of subscription level thing.  This is not to say the site will suddenly turn in to something like LiveJournal.

The next thing I'm about to work on is converting the entry editor over to using AJAX.  Probably the largest improvement that will make is to make it much faster to use when doing multiple saves while working on a single entry.  After all, "save early, save often" is the saying I use when people complain that something they where working on vanished (computer crashed, etc.) before they could save it even once.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-11-09 06:50:36
Subject: That whole voting thing
Entry: We'll I never made the time to do a write up on most of the ballot measures, etc., but I did vote and that's the important part.  Of the results I've heard people talking about, so far it seems I got most of what I voted for.  I didn't realize there were so many things on the ballot until I was marking off on my sample ballot.  Gee whiz.  And apparently there was "a record low" turn out.  Feh!
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-11-05 09:33:26
Subject: Erg
Entry: I haven't yet gotten around to writing up my stuff on this years political garbage.  I've been fairly busy between work, some yard work, watching TV, and not doing a damn thing.  Oh, and there is the time-sink of learning some AJAX stuff just because it's kind of cool (though a total pain in the ass, mostly).

In a few hours we're going to go look at some American Bulldog puppies.  The pictures of them where they were a couple weeks old were so cute!  Surely they're still as cute, if not just cooler looking!

But, yes, I've got a pile of political mailers in the corner, the official guide under those, and I should be able to spank out a little something later this afternoon.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-10-21 23:25:48
Subject: "foxtrot uniform charlie kilo" - yes, it's been that kind of a day (and it's a song)
Entry:
I've been working on some equipment just about all day and listening to my Sirius receiver most of that time.  At one point there was a song by the Bloodhound Gang called, "foxtrot uniform charlie kilo."  I didn't know that at the time until I heard the NATO spelling and stopped to spell it out (waitng for the line to be repeated).  When I hear stuff like that, it really stands out.

Here are the lyrics:
Vulcanize the whoopee stick
In the ham wallet

Cattle prod the oyster ditch
With the lap rocket

Batter dip the cranny ax
In the gut locker

Retrofit the pudding hatch
Ooh la la
With the boink swatter

If i get you in the loop when I make a point to be straight with you then
In lieu of the innuendo in the end know my intent though
I brazillian wax poetic so pathetically
I don't wanna beat around the bush

Foxtrot Unifrom Charlie Kilo
Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo

Marinate the nether rod
In the squish mitten

Power drill the yippee bog
With the dude piston

Pressure wash the quiver bone
In the bitch wrinkle

Cannonball the fiddle cove
Ooh la la
With the pork steeple

If i get you in the loop when I make a point to be straight with you then
In lieu of the innuendo in the end know my intent though
I brazillian wax poetic so pathetically
I don't wanna beat around the bush

Foxtrot Unifrom Charlie Kilo
Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo

Put the you know what in the you know where
Put the you know what in the you know where
Put the you know what in the you know where
Put the you know what in the you know where pronto
Those lyrics make me giggle like a school child.  heh
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-10-21 10:05:22
Subject: Black as the night itself!
Entry:

It's amazing the difference a little bit of black shoe polish makes on boots.  The boots I bought about a year and a half ago and had been wearing almost every day since were starting to look a bit .. worn.  And since last Sunday when I spend a half hour putting the least amount of polish on them they look as good as new.  Awesome.

Of course I also picked up some new shoes for wearing to work.  Nice black leather ones with comfortable soles.  Won't need to take these off when going through the metal detectors.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-10-19 06:23:12
Subject: A "joke" to kick off this years ballot fun
Entry:
The following joke arrived in my inbox at work, which was a bit surprising, but somewhat funny nonetheless:
The Republican Fisherman ...

A woman in a hot air balloon realizes she is lost. She lowers her Altitude And spots a man fishing from a boat below. She shouts to him,

"Excuse Me, Can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don't know where I am."

The man consults his portable GPS and replies, "You're in a hot air Balloon, Approximately 30 feet above a ground elevation of 2,346 feet above sea level.  You are at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100 degrees, 49.09 minutes west longitude."

She rolls her eyes and says, "You must be a Republican!"

"I am," replies the man. "How did you know?"

"Well," answers the balloonist, "everything you tell me is technically correct, but I have no idea what to do with your information, and I'm still lost.  Frankly, you're not much help to me."

The man smiles and responds, "You must be a Democrat."

"I am," replies the balloonist. "How did you know?"

"Well," says the man, "You don't know where you are or where you're going.  You've risen to where you are, due to a large quantity of hot air.  You Made a promise that you have no idea how to keep, and now you expect me to solve your problem.  You're in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but, somehow, now it's my fault."
It was prefaced with, "could this be Hillary afloat?" and finished with, "amen!"  The first is, eh, and the second I'm just not down with.

Obviously depending on your political stance you can easily substitute parties and it'll fir your world view just perfectly.  The point isn't that one is better than the other, because they both suck, the point is more along the lines of how when you try and help people out with your best intentions, sometimes things don't go so well and you end up with the blame for making things worse.  That of course is one of the central things about both of these parties...

Over the next few days I'll try and post some info about the current measures and propositions on the ballot for this area.  I read someone elses last night (which reminded me that I need to do the same), and it was kind of sad to have seen them put quite a bit of work in to a couple of their analysis but miss out on some big points which should have swung things in the other direction.  Oh well.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-10-07 22:18:45
Subject: A bad hard drive ... and rings
Entry: I got bored, for a bit, and tore apart a dead laptop hard drive this evening.  I took a few pictures along the way, though since I used flash they didn't look so good on the view screen and I'll likely never post them anywhere (if I even keep them).  In case you were wondering, the drive had a fair case of crashed heads.

When I got to the part where I wanted to remove the platter (this is the disc where the data actually resides), I had to use two screw drivers to hold it still so I could loosen the screw holding everything in place.  The design is actually kind of cool - it seems to have been designed in such a way where they could have easily expanded from one to two platters by merely adding a second platter on top of the spacer ring and below the retaining plate, and adding the two reading heads for the second platter.

While messing with the retaining ring i put it on a random finger.  And because I couldn't remember for sure which the ring finger is I had to look it up.  And of course a visit to another page to find out which finger a wedding ring goes on I had to look that up as well.  Which didn't really help as much as I would have liked.  I know the answer is there if I go read it a little more carefully, but it's not an important detail.

It's made of aluminum so it wouldn't last so well but that is ok.  This would be perhaps the simplest and nerdiest ring ever devised.  Ever.  I dare you to come up with a nerdier one.

Did you know that the Latin word for left is "sinistra", a word that evolved into the English word "sinister" ?  Neither did I.  This is especially funny considering some cultures use the left ringfinger for wedding rings.  Coincidence?

Also, did you know there are "puzzle rings"?  4, 6, 8, 12, and 21 ring puzzles.  The twelve ring puzzle was 21 steps to assemble it.  I don't know if I want to know how many steps are involved for a 21 ring puzzle.  These sound cool at first, but once you delve into the history of these things you realize they're meant as a form of torture.

So anyway, yeah, I took apart a bad laptop hard drive.  I'm saving the mirror-like platter for the next time I find a bad 3.5" floppy disk so I can make a wicked cool Enterprise from the parts.  I already have one (have for a few years, actually), but this one would be cooler.  Maybe I'll make it at work next week.  Hmm...
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-10-06 06:45:10
Subject: eh, nothing important
Entry: Two mornings ago I got to the train a little late for my usual ride and caught the one that goes in the opposie direction to the end, then turns around.  This is what I usually do and one of the nice things about it is that it allows me to get a seat all to myself (unless the train becomes too crowded).  So Wednesday morning when it got to the end and the driver changed ends, I looked up and saw him prepping the gimp-steps.  Instead of the usual sky blue shirts the drivers usually have, this guy was in a dark blue (almost black) uniform with gloves and one of those cop hats.  I haven't quite figured out how to properly articulate my first thought on it, but it was a bit of a surreal sight.

Last night on the way to the bank to deposit a rebate check I was behind a flatbed truck at a light for quite a while.  I was trying to figure out what one of the words on the bumper sticker might have been because the rest of it didn't make much sense without it.  Then I looked up at the stuff on the truck.  I wish I had noticed the stuff on it much sooner as they were a couple of the big red-neck chainsaws!  One looked like it was a V8 like the one I saw in a video a while back, but with a shorter chain.  I got a picture of it with my phone, but being a camera phone image and at night the picture essentially sucks.  I'll probably post it somewhere anyway though.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-09-21 18:47:09
Subject: Are you an undercover cop?
Entry:
On the way home some kid asked me if I was an undercover cop almost as soon as I got on the train.  And really, that's a pretty stupid question as undercover police/etc. don't have to answer that question truthfully.  I'm not sure if the kid was trying to sell something or not as his speach was, well, not so good.

When we went by bum central, he exclaimed, "there's a lot of bums out there!"  I couldn't help but think, "yeah, and you're going to be one of them at this rate."  He then went on to say, to no one, "75 to 85 percent of them are black."  Then he started to ask the RT security guy questions - Why are the seats so faded?  Why is the train so slow?;  The RT guard pretty much started to ignore the kid at this point.

The train was virtually empty this evening which was a welcome change from yesterday which had all four cars packed before they cut the last two off...
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-08-28 00:10:29
Subject: District B-13 this week?
Entry: I just remembered to check The Crests calendar to find out when they will stop playing District B-13.  And it's a good thing I did because I only really have two days this week to do it in, and if I miss them then it means I'll have to wait for it on DVD if it isn't on DVD already.  If it is on DVD then I can just NetFlix it, but it won't be quite the same.

Ah, yes, it will be released on DVD September 5th, 2006  All hope is not lost, then, if I miss it.  Interestingly the DVD cover art, which is slightly different than the poster, claims to be presented by Luc Besson.  Which would make sense because he was the producer.  Rox0r.

So, right, because of scheduling it'll be Tuesday or Thursday evening.
Read

Who: E!
Date: 2006-08-20 12:10:33
Subject: Relaxing B-Day and weekend
Entry: Friday was my birthday, spent at work with a reasonable about of busy work the whole time.  Lunch was good, even though the co-workers may have gotten a bit miffed since I didn't go out to lunch with them.  That would primarily be my loss seeing as the lunch would have been paid for by them, but I had enough things to do that I couldn't afford the nearly two hour lunch as well as having already made plans.

Friday night we went to Marrakech which is always a nice change of pace.  We got the hot and spicy lamb and the lamb with honey.  Both very good.

Saturday afternoon we went out to have dinner downtown and watch Superman Returns at the Esquire IMAX and then A Scanner Darkly at The Crest.  Superman was pretty cool, and the four 3D parts were a nice touch, though I'm not sure if it was the process used or the glasses themselves which introduced some visual anomalies.  Seeing it on the big-big screen was definitely a good idea, though a pricey one at $15 per ticket.

While waiting in the lobby for A Scanner Darkly to start one of the workers started riding his bike through the lobby and once even rode into the main screening room...  I got a couple pictures of this which I tried to post somewhere directly from my phone, but that site sucks so the pictures never actually got posted.  I'll have to copy them off the phone and post them somewhere else non-sucky.  While eating dinner earlier a girl that works at The Crest was at the pizza place we were at and was talking with the workers there about the movies they were showing.  When we got to The Crest she recognized us and said the name of the restaurant.  Kind of funny, kind of odd.

A Scanner Darkly wasn't what I had expected it to be, though that's certainly not a bad thing.  The animation overlaid on the acting was, for the most part, very well done.  The story was decent and I wonder what the original story is like.  It had some pretty cool ideas in it, such as the scatter suit and it's use.  The ending was pretty jacked up but that just made it better, more believable story.

We're thinking we might have to go see stuff at The Crest about once a month.  The trouble is finding out what is playing and when, though their website and actually paying attention when going past it during the day might help with that.  The next thing on their list I want to see is District B13, which if it is the film I saw a snippet from a while back should prove to be pretty bad-ass:
Paris, 2010: An isolation wall surrounds the ghetto cities. Without effective law enforcement within these walls, gang rule is absolute. Damien (Cyril Raffaelli) is a member of an elite police squadron, a special unit highly trained in martial arts and the precise physical skills necessary to navigate the treacherous urban landscape of Paris' future. He is now tasked with the most vital and dangerous mission of his career: to retrieve a loose nuke stolen by the most powerful gang of 'District B-13.'
2006, Color, 1 hour 25 minutes, Rated R
In French with English subtitles
I think I'll be seeing that.  The snippet I saw a while back was one of the guys doing some crazy-assed shit to escape from a building jumping all over the place and jumping from building to building, etc.  It was pretty impressively put together.  Even if that isn't this one, this should be good on its one.
Read

[Back] [Top] [Index] [List] [View] [Calendar] [Friends] [Bio]