A Career of Evil

Why must people make my head hurt?

Sun, 12 Apr 2009 22:31:35 GMT

So, the bulk of my news comes from the brief exposure to Morning Edition I get on the drive to work, perhaps a little of Marketplace on the way home (generally not), the various industry related news that I am able to access from the aggregaters which I am subscribed to at work (where I get to hold the 'slightly reasonable-liberal-minority' point of view), the news which I get from @Breaking News on Twitter (not on the phone feed) & other cute feeds which my friends post on Twitter.

I can't exactly remember the first time in which I was able to see a clip from The Rachael Maddow Show on MSNBC, but I believe it had something to do with the out-going Bush administration still trying to claim that Iraq was a threat to the world security...
...anyway, I love the presentation then, and now I REALLY love it when she talks about the upcoming Republican protest/holiday:

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I can not wait to play this up at work.
I will bring a few celebratory teas & drink it ALL DAY LONG!

If for some reason the embedding doesn't work, try <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908#30145811">here.</a>

Small thoughts

Mon, 02 Mar 2009 04:48:56 GMT

Damn, I started this then ScribeFire ate it... always annoying.

A few thoughts I have had for a couple of months.

1) For the Cthulhu oriented people reading my semi-blog:
Run, do not walk to Gloomi's Unspeakable Vault of Doom. This is quite an amusing web-comic based on the works of H.P. Lovecraft & others in his mythos. Cute & vaguely fluffy. I think it is a different flavor of cute than _Lonesome Night in October_ by Zelanzy.
I really do recommend going to the beginning and working through to the end as he begins with dread Cthulhoo & slowly adds other of the Elder/Outer gods to the strip.. with additional denizens & creatures added later. I have been using the free icons which Gloomi provides, specifically Shubby, otherwise known as Shub Niggurath- Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young.
He also provides cute swag.

2)For the Steampunk fans:
Again, run, do not walk to Girl Genius.
The delightfully perverse story of an alternate earth history set in Europe done by Phil & Kaja Foglio. Quite good.
Quite silly occasionally.

3) Belief:
At last week's forray into downtown Dallas, during dinner at the Iron Cactus, the food was delivered & after a little sampling all around, one dish was described as holy meat.
I then made a joke which I will not repeat surrounding St. Mary which resulted in much laughter from our little end of the big table. As is always the case, I was concerned that I had offended the one specifically religeous person at the end of the table, but he happily indicated that he wasn't catholic and didn't deify St. Mary in that manner...that left The Wife (lutheran) and myself (catholic) as the only religous persons around.
Now, here is the problem... I am defining myself lately as an agnostic.
That is to say that I have for many years been struggling with my Catholic upbringing and reconciling it vs. my opinion of the church & what I have been told is faith. The best answer that I have right now is that I don't have enough information either way to either give up the concept of faith or to believe that god does not exist.
This of course is different from my friend Tim, who flat out indicates that god does not exist. He is an atheist.
This is also different from my friend Nigel, who is clearly a theist. Specifically a Methodist, as I believe it. He is very set on the Bible as having the truth within it.
Last year, after my departure from Iowa, my friends seemed to fall into a terrible disagreement surrounding religion, the end result of which I have been a little shy of upsetting people regarding theirs.
I am glad that my little joke went over ok.

4) Profit sharing + tax refunds has resulted in a drastic reduction of debit load for the family unit. In the end, we will have one of three credit cards paid off, one of the remaining two down to a three digit balance to be paid off before the birthdays arrive, leaving the third to be quickly whittled down. WOO HOO!

5)I am currently rubbing my hands together constantly in a Lady Macbeth sort-of way due to the final coat of vanish on the project for The Wife. I will stop when the stickiness is gone, or the blood starts.

6) Lost: through Season 4 now (thank you Tim)
BSG: into season 4 now, having watched Razor.
The Venture Bros.: Through Season 2, waiting on season 3.
Deadwood: Finished with the produced seasons.
On deck: Heroes, further into The 4400, Dexter, Army Wives, Season 8 of CSI: (Las Vegas) and a re-watch of Coupling.

7) I am urging everyone reading who is north of the Red River to take advantage of the shows which are going to be in the various areas for you this summer.
To whit:
Cowboy Mouth:
5/9/2009 Council Bluffs, IA
6/27/2009 Milwaukee, WI
7/16/2009 Des Moines, IA

Flogging Molly:
3/10/2009 House of Blues, Boston, MA
3/16/2009 House of Blues, Chicago, IL
3/17/2009 Congress Theater, Chicago, IL

Gaelic Storm:
3/3/2009 Akron, IA
3/4/2009 Omaha, NE
3/5/2009 Pella, IA (sold out?)
3/10/2009 Dubuque, IA
3/13 & 3/14/2009 House of Blues, Chicago, IL
4/9/2009 Foxborough, MA
8/1 & 2/2009 Waterloo, IA

Now, I know that not everyone will appreciate what I am suggesting here, but help support the economy. See these artists when it is possible.
They all three put on great shows!
If nothing else, I know that there are a couple of people reading this who will want to see a couple of the bands multiple times.
8) Oh yeah, I learned how to not blow up everyone's friends page by using cuts, thank me later.

Mon, 02 Mar 2009 00:08:23 GMT

According to Jason (& his version of this), the books listed below are important in some way. Or, perhaps, they just tell you about your friends’ taste in books.

Whatever! It’s a meme, take it for what it is.

Instructions:

1) Look at the list and put an ‘x’ after those you have read.
2) Add a ‘+’ to the ones you LOVE.
3) Star (*) those you plan on reading.
4) Tally your total at the bottom.

How many have you read?

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien X+
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling X
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible X
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell X
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman *
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller X +
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare X
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien X +
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger X
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald X
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams X +
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll X
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame X
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis X
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis X
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne X
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell *
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown X
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding *
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert X +
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley *
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck X
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov *
63 The Secret History - Donna Tart
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas *
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac *
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville X
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker *
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens X
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White X +
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle X+
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad X
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery X+
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks X+
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams X
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas *
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare X+
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl X+
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
101 The Book of the New Sun series - Gene Wolfe X
102 The Buru Quartet - Pramoedya Ananta Toer
103 The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
104 On Wings of Song - Thomas M. Disch
105 Watchmen - Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons X +

Five books which Shawn thinks need adding:
106 Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert Heinlein X+
107 Siddhartha - Hermann Hesse X+
108 Night - Elie Wiesel X+
109 The Dead Zone - Stephen King X+
110 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea - Jules Verne X+

Wait, how do I score this thing?

I am such a meme-ie

Sat, 28 Feb 2009 05:04:05 GMT

Another meme stolen (originally from Facebook, which I am shifting to LiveJournal)

1. You can ONLY answer Yes or No!
2. You are NOT ALLOWED to explain ANYTHING unless someone messages or comments you and Asks!

"Now, here's what you're supposed to do... And please do not spoil the Fun. Copy and paste this into your notes , delete my answers, type in your answers and tag as many of your friends as you'd like to. Then see what happens."

Kissed any one of your ~~facebook~~ LiveJournal friends? Yes
Been arrested? Yes
Kissed someone you didn't like? No
Slept in until 5 PM? Yes
Fallen asleep at work/school? Yes
Held a snake? Yes
Ran a red light? Yes
Been suspended from school? No
Totaled your car/motorbike in an accident? No
Been fired from a job? Yes
Sang karaoke? Yes
Done something you told yourself you wouldn't? Yes
Laughed until something you were drinking came out your nose? Yes
Caught a snowflake on your tongue? Yes
Kissed in the rain? Yes
Sang in the shower? Yes
Sat on a rooftop? Yes
Been pushed into a pool with all your clothes? No
Broken a bone? Yes
Shaved your head? No
Blacked out from drinking? No
Played a prank on someone? Yes
Felt like killing someone? Yes
Made your girlfriend/boyfriend cry? Yes
Had Mexican jumping beans for pets? No
Been in a band? Yes
Shot a gun? Yes
Tripped on mushrooms? No
Donated Blood? Yes
Eaten alligator meat? Yes
Eaten cheesecake? Yes
Still love someone you shouldn't? Yes
Believe in love? Yes
Sleep on a certain side of the bed? Yes
Believe in fate? No
Believe that things "happen for a reason"? No
Held a grudge for longer than a year? Yes
Hid a secret for a long period of time? Yes
Miss someone on your ~~facebook~~ LiveJournal list of friends? Yes
Changed the oil in your vehicle? No
Threw up after riding a roller coaster? No

Quick meme

Sat, 28 Feb 2009 04:57:59 GMT

Describe me in one word- just one single word. Positive or negative.

-Leave your word in a comment before looking at what words others have used.

-Copy and paste the meme to your journal to find out how people describe you when limited to one word, or not.

Nerd Meme

Sun, 15 Feb 2009 22:05:00 GMT

Mightygodking came up with a handy-dandy nerdiness quantification system. Go through the list and bold your highest level of nerdiness!

BATMAN

Not Nerdy: Going to see The Dark Knight in a theater.
Slightly Nerdy: Dressing up as the Joker for Halloween (Heath Ledger version)
Fairly Nerdy: Buying Batman comics other than Year One or The Dark Knight Returns
Nerdy: Dressing up as the Joker for Halloween (Cesar Romero version)
Really Nerdy: Writing Batman fan fiction
Dangerously Nerdy: Writing Batman fan fiction where he has sex with Alfred.

STAR WARS

Not Nerdy: Seeing the movies
Slightly Nerdy: Owning a toy lightsaber
Fairly Nerdy: Learning to play the Cantina Song on your musical instrument of choice
Nerdy: Knowing in which “expanded universe” novel Admiral Ackbar dies
Really Nerdy: Membership in a Stormtrooper fan brigade
Dangerously Nerdy: Defending the idea of Jar Jar Binks

HARRY POTTER

Not Nerdy: You read the books
Slightly Nerdy: You liked all of the books
Fairly Nerdy: You own a wand
Nerdy: You read fanfic that “fixes Rowling’s mistakes”
Really Nerdy: You are a fan of “wizard rock”
Dangerously Nerdy: You have an alternate “Hogwarts persona”

MAGIC: THE GATHERING

Not Nerdy: “They still make that? I played it when I was in high school for a bit, but never got into it”
Slightly Nerdy: “Yeah, it was fun, but I couldn’t keep up with all the expansions so I sold my cards”
Fairly Nerdy: “Do you mind if I use a proxy for Nicol Bolas? I mean, he’s forty bucks”
Nerdy: “You haven’t really played this game until you play draft; it’s how the game is meant to be played”
Really Nerdy: “Okay, if we’re all supposed to be planeswalkers, how come there are planeswalker cards? Am I Ajani? I don’t feel like a lion-man”
Dangerously Nerdy: “I’ve tested this deck against all comers and now all I need is to win free airfare and I’m on my way to the World Championships in Tokyo”

H.P. LOVECRAFT

Not Nerdy: Recognizing the name “Cthulhu”
Slightly Nerdy: Knowing the proper pronunciation of “Cthulhu”
Fairly Nerdy: Owning a Cthulhu plushie.
Nerdy: Running a Call of Cthulhu campaign
Really Nerdy: Organizing a chapter of the Campus Crusade For Cthulhu
Dangerously Nerdy: Actually reading any of Lovecraft’s stories

NERD TELEVISION

Not Nerdy: Lost
Slightly Nerdy: Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Fairly Nerdy: Battlestar Galactica
Nerdy: Stargate: Atlantis
Really Nerdy: Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog
Dangerously Nerdy: The Adventures of Brisco County Jr.

STAR TREK

Not Nerdy: The Next Generation
Slightly Nerdy: Deep Space Nine
Fairly Nerdy: the one where Picard rides a dune buggy
Nerdy: any of the novels
Really Nerdy: owning a phaser
Dangerously Nerdy: speaking fluent Klingon

COMPUTER USE

Not Nerdy: Macs
Slightly Nerdy: Knowing how to use Windows rather than just knowing “how to do emails”
Fairly Nerdy: Knowing the actual reasons Windows sucks
Nerdy: Anything to do with Linux
Really Nerdy: Getting all of the coding jokes in XKCD
Dangerously Nerdy: “I’m bringing BeOS back!”

A year in review - NOT!

Sun, 15 Feb 2009 21:28:19 GMT

Well, I had previously started a post after the new year reviewing the last year.

Now that it is well into February, I am letting that go. All those who are shocked, please comment on that.

*listens to the crickets chirp*
Ah, I appreciate honesty like that.

I have been enticed by a ~~fiend~~friend into a browser based game called Tribal Wars. It is a bit of a time sink, which breaks up the day at work (when I get to the available computers to log in) and isn't terribly demanding.
Also, with my complaining on Twitter about the impending crash of the home computer & my subsequent loss of fun links & stuff, Binderodaemons recommended Tumblr to me for quick link storage. So I have a Tumblr page now and am slowly moving links which I treasure over there. VnHaln.tumblr.com
Minus the porn, of course.

I still have yet to break through the Catholic conditioning which results in me keeping some parts of sex private. It, of course, doesn't help that with the transplanting of my life that I am working on not offending the friends, partial friends & potentially future friends that I am meeting.
I mean, lets be honest... nobody wants to have the experience which Brad & Tim had back in the early days of the House of Dice. Calmly clicking through the various downloaded porn on the computer & then running across something which Rob had saved on the computer just for the fun of it. Something like amputee porn, or worse.

But because I know that Tim was exposed to that, making jokes or references short of that mark is certainly 'in bounds' around him. He has seen worse.
Just as long as I am not making them around his kids.

I don't yet know where the lines are down here and am not wanting to cause offense.

Ah well, the pitfalls of a move away from one's comfort zone.

Instead, I will relate a little bit of story from this month.
So, after last month's rent fiasco (short version... we wrote a check, which we never do for rent & the doofuses in the office here, because they probably had a us renting for half of January & couldn't get their shit together re: the new lease for January 1, didn't cash it immediately & were expecting a second rent check from us... resulting in eviction notice #1. When we straightened that out, they then didn't cash the check for a week, resulting an a bounced rent check & eviction notce #2) we have been watching the checking account pretty regularly...
When out purchasing materials for a project at The Wife's job, the purchas was denied... becase a charge for $89.41 was applied to the account from some one we didn't know.
So, I started the process of reversing the charge, which includes a police report. I had this done in record time when all of a sudden, a bottle of pills arrives in the mail. After some checking, we found that a little sneaky company called Inner BoddyHealth decided that The Wife needed a refill of the dietary supliment that she ordered 6 months ago & paid the shipping with a credit card.
After a terse phone call, with the words "Attorney General" used, the account was closed & the pills were returned... we are still awaiting a refund... so the police report is still open & we are prepared to contest the charge.
Halfway through, we recieved new debit cards due to the security concern with Heartland...so I am waiting to see the refund before closing the police report.
Anyway, last weekend was a trip to the inaccurately named Dallas World Aquarium. A nice little place, a little crowded for The Wife (who has a slight difficulty with crowds) but good company, meaning Electrobat, Armored Mind, CheapS1utSaviour, Crashbot, Vampymissk & Dawaoiser & several others who are not LJ people. A nice time was had & The Wife took pictures, which I will make sure are distributed and approved before provided for general consumption. Then dinner at the Iron Cactus & a trip back home.

This weekend, I am staining the project for The Wife's work... one coat done, some scratching & another coat to go.

Also, a trip to Circut City occured, with a couple of things purchased & a few others earmarked for the next trip when the accounts are straightened out.

Another post to follow RSN: (Real Soon Now)
Which in this case = today... I have to do a couple of things first.

Again, Meme central here.

Mon, 22 Dec 2008 04:34:56 GMT

From [info]galileo669 & [info]Casselsander...

As the Filmspotting guys would say, this is my "Star Wars Memorial List", probably to be dubbed the "Lord of the Rings" list in my case:

1. Name a movie that you have seen more than 10 times: "My Favorite Year"
2. Name a movie that you've seen multiple times in a theater: "LotR: The Fellowship of the Ring"
3. Name an actor that would make you more inclined to see a movie: Johnny Depp
4. Name an actor that would make you less likely to see a movie: Sarah Jessica Parker
5. Name a movie that you can quote from: (just one?) "Running Scared" (1986)
6. Name a movie musical that you know all the lyrics to all the songs: "South Pacific" (more because I played in the pit orchestra for three separate productions of the f-er.)
7. Name a movie that you have been known to sing along with: “White Christmas"
8. Name a movie that you would recommend everyone see: "Good Will Hunting"
9. Name an unusual movie that you own: "The Call of Cthulhu", the HPLHS did a silent movie version of it... quite good.
10. Name an actor that launched his/her entertainment career in another medium but who has surprised you with his/her acting chops: Robin Williams
11. Have you ever seen a movie in a drive-in?: Yes
12. Ever made out in a movie?: Yes
13. Name a movie that you keep meaning to see but just haven't gotten around to it: "The Godfather"
14. Ever walked out of a movie?: No
15. Name a movie that made you cry: "E.T: the Extra Terrestrial"
16. Popcorn?: Yes
17. How often do you go to the movies?: About twice a month until recently.
18. What's the last movie you saw in the theater?: "Hellboy II: The Golden Army".
19. What is your favorite/preferred genre of movie?: Fantastic-horror or Horrific-Fantasy.
20. What was the first movie you remember seeing in the theater?: "The Shaggy D.A.", although my mother tells me that I was taken to "Blue Water, White Death" when I was a toddler.

Horror Flick Meme

Sat, 15 Nov 2008 23:05:34 GMT

It is a little out of season, but I am a little behind.

This, from <a href="http://www.mikeoliveri.com/2008/11/13/horror-flick-meme/">Mike Oliveri's blog</a> is a list of the top 50 horror movies as determined by Metro.co.us and then the bolded titles are the ones I have not seen.

I figure I am doing reasonably well in the genre, but the things I am missing are pretty glaring.

1.The Exorcist. William Friedkin (1973)
2.The Shining. Stanley Kubrick (1980)
3.Alien. Ridley Scott (1979)
4.The Silence of the Lambs. Jonathan Demme (1991)
5. Saw. James Wan (2004)
6.Halloween. John Carpenter (1978)
7.A Nightmare on Elm Street. Wes Craven (1984)
8.Ring (Ringu). Hideo Nakata (1998)
9.The Wicker Man. Robin Hardy (1973)
10.The Omen. Richard Donner (1976)
11.The Birds. Alfred Hitchcock (1963)
12.The Thing. John Carpenter (1982)
13.Lost Boys. Joel Schumacher (1987)
14.Dawn of the Dead. George A Romero (1978)
15.The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Tobe Hooper (1974)
16.Jaws. Steven Spielberg (1975)
17.The Blair Witch Project. Daniel Myrick & Eduardo Sanchez (1999)
18.An American Werewolf in London. John Landis (1981)
19.Se7en. David Fincher (1995)
20.Poltergeist. Tobe Hooper (1982)
21.The Amityville Horror. Stuart Rosenberg (1979)
22.Candyman. Bernard Rose (1992)
23.Scream. Wes Craven (1996)
24.Carrie. Brian De Palma (1976)
25.Friday the 13th. Sean S Cunningham (1980)
26.Final Destination. James Wong (2000)
27.The Evil Dead. Sam Raimi (1981)
28.Hellraiser. Clive Barker (1987)
29.Hostel. Eli Roth (2005)
30.Salem’s Lot. Mikael Salomon (2004)
31.The Descent. Neil Marshall (2005)
32.The Hills Have Eyes. Wes Craven (1977)
33.Wolf Creek. Greg McLean (2005)
34.Misery. Rob Reiner (1991)
35.Rosemary’s Baby. Roman Polanski (1968)
36.Child’s Play. Tom Holland (1989)
37.The Orphanage. Juan Antonio Bayona (2008)
38.The Entity. Sidney J Furie (1981)
39.Nosferatu. FW Murnau (1922)
40.Night of the Living Dead. George A. Romero (1968)
41.House on Haunted Hill. William Malone (2000)
42.The Haunting. Robert Wise (1963)
43.It. Tommy Lee Wallace (1990)
44.Audition. Takashi Miike (1999)
45.The Changeling. Peter Medak (1980)
46.The Mist. Frank Darabont (2008)
47.Suspiria. Dario Argento (1977)
48.The Vanishing. George Sluizer (1993)
49.Shutter. Masayuki Ochiai (2008)
50.Planet Terror. Robert Rodriguez (2007)

Today, I will be a lemming....

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 03:12:01 GMT

Comment and I will...

a) Tell you why I friend-ed you.

b) Associate you with something -- a song, color, photo, etc.

c) Tell you something I like about you.

d) Tell you a memory I have of you.

e) Ask you something I've wanted to know about you.

f) Tell you my favorite user-pic from your list.

In return, you should post this on your own LiveJournal, but I will not require it.

Well, it ain' that pretty at all...

Sun, 26 Oct 2008 21:24:49 GMT

'... so I'm gonna hurl myself against the wall.
'cause I'd rather feel bad than feel nothing at all." - 'Ain't that Pretty at All' - Warren Zevon

No, this isn't one of those posts...there is just a line in the song about taking a short vacation which relates to my upcoming week. The Wife and I are taking a small vacation north to Iowa, to see friends, to ease the transition to living in Texas, to do many things.

Wednesday: will start with help from a co-worker (notice, not a cow-orker.. I like this one) getting us to DFW, the arrival in Cedar Rapids with the subsequent arrival in Iowa City. We will be signing some Last Will & Testament stuff, arrive @ crash space #1, then meet up an older friend of mine & his wife, then heading out to the Reservoir for a bonfire & other stuff.

Thursday: transferring our bags & such to the hotel for the convention, The Wife will have a private appointment & we will help with set up for the convention. I may need to pick up the artist Guest of Honor (Alan M. Clarke) from the airport & be his liaison for the next couple of days. I might also find the time to stop into the Iowa office in order to drop off some things.

Friday: Convention set up, possibly be the liaison/run & fetch boy for Mr. Clarke, get into costume for the convention since it will be Halloween. I suspect that I will end up hunting witches for many hours, getting stupid drunk & trying to be stupid in my relationship. Also, the dance for the convention has been moved to Friday night rather than Saturday due to the band's schedule (see below.)
Oh, I suspect game playing will occur, I will be purchasing yet another copy of The Black Company from Glen Cook, just not autographed for me this time.
Also, passing along a few things which I have been tasked to bring to other friends from my belongings in Dallas.

Saturday: Sleeping in late, more drinking, more gaming, more spending time with friends, I will probably drink more, then listen to Wylde Nept at their show. Again, more attempting to be stupid with my relationship. Still probably attempting to kill witches in the evening.

Sunday: Wrap up the convention, help pack it up, check out of the hotel, go back to crash space #1, say goodbye to the bulk of the friends who I wanted to see as they will have been present over the last couple of days. The Wife will go east to see her extended family unit @ her grandmother's house, where as I will be seeing my extended family unit (my friends) until they all need to go away. The possibly out to the Sunday night movie & hot-tub group whom I have missed over the last while.

Monday: The Sunday-Monday switch is the transition from friends to family during the trip. Monday is pretty open, possibly the stop in at work will be here, but the arrival at crash space #2, my mother's, will occur.

This is always a weird topic to explain to people, but because I have had a really weird family life while growing up, I have given more loyalty and love to my friends than my blood relations. Certainly, my friends have been less disappointing, more stable & more supportive most of the time.
I have talked at length about my mother in the blog, go back and read a little of it. She is one of the few stable factors in my young life which I have forced from the "family" to "friend" label.

Anyway... on to...
Tuesday: Spending the day with my mother & her boyfriend. I am not certain what form this will take, but it will occur. Then a transfer to The Wife's parents & crash space #3

Wednesday: Same as Tuesday but with her parents, they will get us to the airport before the night is over, and back in Texas before the day is out. Picked back up by previous co-worker & back to home.
All in all, a nice break & visit back to the home state.

I am still struggling with the concept that I am living in Texas until I make a decision about it rather than just visiting here until the job will eventually send me back to Iowa.
I don't know that the job will ever evolve into something which will allow me back to the Iowa grocery-store ne call-center. I know that I really never want to be back on the phones, so until I am able to parley my skills & knowledge into something where I can choose where I want to be & have it stick, that I will be here.
That might take a while.

Then there is the far future question which all of the Iowa counselors ask themselves..."Why aren't we a region yet?" Well, I can answer that question now and I don't know when that will change. It takes being shown the larger picture to understand that answer. I don't think that many of the counselors ask the question to the correct people to get the answer and I don't think that many of the supervisors think about trying to answer the question with facts.

It might happen, but I can't hang my hat on it. I have to hang my hat on where I am and what I am doing now.

Enough of that.

I am looking for a group to game with in the area. It can be role-playing or board games on a regular basis. Although we spent last weekend rearranging the apartment to be a real living space rather than a storage unit which we were living in, we still haven't resolved the lack of space in order to support a proper game. We might be close, but the table is in the wrong place.

In other news, with finances being tighter than they should due to mistakes which both The Wife & I perpetrated, we have signed a year long lease for the apartment, which will have us here until next December. Not what we wanted, but what we get.

'nuff for now.
Happy Halloween to all!

When you see this, quote from Shakespheare in your journal

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 02:58:19 GMT

A cute meme from Barthir:

First Witch:Thrice the brinded car hath mew'd.

Second Witch: Thrice and once the hedge-pig whin'd.

Third Witch: Harper cries: 'Tis time, 'tis time.

First Witch: Round about the cauldron go.
In the poison'd entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone
Days and nights hast thirty-one
Swelter'd venom sleeping got.
Boil thou first i' the charmed pot.

All: Double, Double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch: Fillet of a fenny snake
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog.
Woll of bat, and tongeu of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and howlet's wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

All: Double, Double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Third Witch: Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witches' mummy, maw and gulf
Of the racin'd salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,
Liver of blaspheming Jew,
Gall of goat, and slips of yew,
Sliver'd in the moon's eclipse,
Nose of Tuck, and Tartar's lips,
Finger of birth-strangled babe,
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,
Make the gruel thick and slab,
Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
For the ingredients of our cauldron.

All: Double, Double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch: Cool it with a baboon's blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.

Enter Hecate, and the other three Witches

Hecate: O, well done! I commend your pains,
And everyone shall share i’ the gains.
And now about the cauldron sing,
Like elves and fairies in a ring,
Enchanting all that you put in.

Music and a song[:] Black spirits.

SECOND WITCH: By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes:
Open, locks,
Whoever knocks!

Enter Macbeth

MACBETH: How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags!
What are you doing?

ALL: A deed without a name.

The challenge

Sun, 28 Sep 2008 20:12:10 GMT

So, a week ago I called a friend of mine a slacker & an amateur after he posted his list of games.

He challenged me back to post my list.
To be clear, my comments were not only from my experience as a gamer, but from having sat in the house of The Leptopus for a collective weeks on end. He is truly the master.

Ok, we will start with copying Dave's list and removing things I don't have.
(as a note: Dave, you only have 117. The Excel Paste method listed in your comments ends up counting a notation of (I don't have this expansion) which isn't really having the game.)

Amoeba Wars
Aquire
Arkham Horror
Arkham Horror: 2nd edition
Arkham Horror: Curse of the Dark Pharaoh
Arkham Horror: The Dunwich Expansion
Arkham Horror: The Yellow Sign
Assasins
Atlanteon
Auction
Backgammon
Bang
Bang!
Bang!: High Noon
Bang!: Dodge City
Bang!: A Fistful of Cards (all part of the Bang! Bullet)
Battle Cry
Blood Bowl
Blood Bowl: Dungeon Bowl Expansion
Bohnanza
Bosworth
Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Candyland
Cathedral
Chainsaw Warrior
Checkers
Chess
Chess: 4 player board
Chill: Black Moor Mannor
Chrononauts
Chrononauts: The American Revolution
Clue
The Collector
Corruption
Clue
Cults Across America
Curosoe's Planet
Devil's Triangle
Diceland
Diceland: Deep White Sea
Diceland: Extra Space
Diskwars:
Diskwars: Moon Over Thelgrim
Diskwars: Wastelands
Diskwars: Waiqar's Path
Diskwars: Broken Shadows
Dragon Delta
Drakon
Elements
Formula de: tracks #19 & 20
Fortress America
Feudal
Fury of Dracula
Fury of Dracula - 2nd edition
Gangsters
Gecko-opoly
Go
House on Haunted Hill
Husker-Du
Iron Dragon
Jenga
Kill Dr. Lucky
Kill Dr. Lucky: Craignorack Expansion
Knightmare chess: 2nd edition
Last Will & Testament of Mary Ann Burg
Life
Lord of the Fries
Lord of the Rings Boardgame, The
Lunch Money
Lunch Money 2:
Mille Bornes
Monopoly (multiple copies)
Monsters Menace America
Mr. President
Munchkin
Munchkin 2: Unnatural Axe
Munchkin Bites
Notre Dame
Pandemic
Parchessi
Parts Unknown
Past Lives
Pente
Plague & Pestilence
Quo Vadis?
Rail Baron
Railroad Tycoon: The Board Game (half in french!)
Renfield
R.I.P.
RoboRally
RoboRally: Armed and Dangerous
RoboRally: Crash and Burn
Rollout
Rummicub
Scattegories
Set
Settlers of Cattan:
Settlers of Cattan: 5 & 6 Player Expansion
Settlers of Cattan: Knights & Cities Expansion
Sorry
Squad Leader
Squad Leader Advanced
Star Wars: The Queen's Gambit
Starfarers of Cattan
Stop Thief
Sword & Skull
Talisman
The Farming Game: 2nd Edition
The Hills Rise Wild!
The Magnificent Race
Ticket to Ride
Ticket to Ride: 1910 expansion
Titan
Unspeakable Words
Vampire: Prince of the City
Wizard War
Wizards
Yahtzee

That ties the number and I am certain that I have more which I am forgetting @ this time.

Sat, 20 Sep 2008 18:21:04 GMT

1 minute, 22 seconds

No really, quick.

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 03:48:06 GMT

Look, a real post.... not a 6 month late thing.

Hello all.
I got distracted during the last week.
Not that I have a huge following hanging on my every word, but I should still be a little better with this.

Over the last few days I have had friends from Iowa in town. Nigel & Susan came down to spend a bit of their vacation time with us and help the poor Iowa boy not miss home as much. I greatly appreciate their efforts in this endeavor. Still a little homesick, but working on making Dallas home with The Wife which helps.

Quick review.
Electrobat and Armored Mind arranged for a playing of Arkham Horror with friends/relatives of theirs. Very nice people. The dinner was great & the company was good.
I feel bad that the game started late and that perhaps I didn't do a great job of explaining the rules sufficiently.. as we played until about 1 AM with Cthulhu himself as the Ancient One and the decision to end the game was made.
For those familiar, here was the counts:
# of players: 7
Terror level: 10 (multiple monster surges caused the terror level to spiral out of control)
Current monster count on the streets: 10
Outskirts: 1 (thus filled in the 7 player game)
Doom tokens: Cthulhu was sitting at 8 out of 13, but Armoured Mind had the Fire of Asphiral (sp?) making the total possible 14.
Open gates: 3
Sealed gates: 4
Clue tokens held by players: slim, less than 5 for any one player.

Honestly, I call this situation a loss. Particularly when I flipped the next three Mythos cards & had 2 more monster surges & 1 new gate in the next 3 turns. Cthulhu was going to eat a good lunch on our characters.
This was with the Dunwich expansion in play.. which Binder had recommended.

Anyway, good food, good time & hope that it can be arranged again.

Other gaming thoughts: I found a copy of Pandemic and purchased it on the advise of Tim. After the first five playings (1 or 2 at the easy level) a victory over the game hadn't occurred (with three players out of five.)
While Nigel & Susan (and Michael) were in town another attempt was made at the easy version. Again, three players... it was barely a win, but any port in a storm. Damn that is a good game.

The other games played during the last few weeks.
Thurn & Taxis: a nice connect the dots game nominally about establishing mail routes in feudal Germany. I thought I was losing the whole game, but came in second by 2 points. (30 to 28 to 25 points in the three player game.) Nigel won.
Ticket to Ride: Again, three players. I think the winning score was 117 with me at 107. Good game.
Sword & Skull: three players, Nigel won. This isn't much of a shock, Nigel wins many of the games which we play with him.

Lets see. I finished reading Johnathon Strange & Mr. Norrell. Damn this book is long. Review @ goodreads.com
I started the next Discworld novel which I had borrowed from S&S, only to discover that I have read it before. Oh well, I remember liking the story previously so will keep on with it.

Movies: Tropic Thunder:
Good movie, certainly worth a rental for people. I tell you that the cameo appearances by other actors are fantastic. Really, CassielSander says it better than I here.
I saw that this weekend with Nigel & Susan at a movie theater grill... not a bad experience, but not a great one. Not certainly if I will be doing that again, particularly then I had to ask for a refill multiple times before getting one. F'ers.

I have continued the process of making The Wife watch crazy Netflix movies, to my own detriment. I recently received & watched The Beastmaster, a wonderful memory from growing up.
Perhaps you have heard how one shouldn't re-read books from their teenage years? WOW... same with movies. What a steaming pile that movie really was. Where was my head at?
Oh, blinded by staring at Tanya Roberts as a shirtless redhead in a miniskirt costume making high kicks. I remember that.
I also forced her to watch THX 1138 & Dr. Strangelove, both of which I had escaped college without watching. I owe her pretty big.
Luckily, Assassins is up next. That will raise my stock a little... and I will have to bump up Eastern Promises & a chick flick.
Partially because I know that A Clockwork Orange is up RSN.
The Wife seems to have gotten addicted to the following things: Charmed (and really, watching Rose McGowen, Alyssa Milano & Holly Marie Combs bounce around on too, too cold sets isn't too bad. Also playing the tattoo drinking game is a fun diversion,) L.A. Banks novels & Facebook.

The good news is that she will be starting the house hunt this week, which makes her happy.

Enough for now.

New social experiment

Mon, 28 Jul 2008 00:48:38 GMT

I believe that I have lived in this state a sufficient amount of time to propose a new social experiment.

This is what I would like everyone to do:
1) Take an hour or so from a day, make it a day where you don't have to be anywhere and don't have any real grocery shopping to do.

2) Go to a non-local grocery store for you. DO NOT go to the store you regularly patronize.

3) Grab a cart when you enter the store and wander around putting a few non-cool/frozen items in it. A loaf of bread, some pop, a couple boxes of crackers, maybe some paper products. Make it look real.

4) Take it to a location in the store which is badly laid out.

5) (and here it the clincher) look up as if you have remembered something down an aisle and walk away from the cart.

6) Exit the store, re-enter the store and start from #1 again. Make sure to leave your subsequent carts in different locations, but make sure you pass near the previous ones to see your progress.

I believe that within 20 or 30 minutes that you will have congested traffic around your little left-over carts so badly that no one will be able to move around the store.

I have noticed that people don't mind just wandering away from their damned shopping carts, even when they are in the middle of the freakin' lane.
Nor do they want to touch anyone's stuff...

Let me know what you think, or what you observe.

Settling in

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 02:49:19 GMT

*no music this evening other than the clack clack of a laptop being repaired*

OK.
First: no apologies.
*Damn, that makes me want to listen to Type O*

Second: The Wife has arrived, so life is beginning to stagger back to its normal pace. At her encouragement, as a self described "small town girl in the big city", the third floor apartment is a bit of a workout, but will certainly help keep the pounds off from the large Texan size dinners. (Damn, these people charge a lot for a meal, but sometimes they feed you the proper amount for your money.)

Third: Work is becoming manageable, which makes me believe that I will survive. Although I am still behind, which I am beginning to accept as a constant situation, I believe that I am smart enough, strong enough and darn it... people like me.

Fourth: The Wife is beginning to come around.
For the last couple of weeks, she has indicated that it has felt like a vacation with all of her stuff along, which is a little dangerous since I am pretty certain that we will need another income to afford a house that we want and don't have to fix the foundation.
Part of my indication that she is coming around involves her usage of the laptop which she got from J, which resulted in 305 viruses, bad files, Malware & Trojan programs needing to be removed in about 1 week of usage.
At least she was looking a sites which I approve of ;-)
*music fades from Too Late: Frozen to Splendid Isolation - Warren Zevon*

Fifth: I am clearly not drinking enough. No strike that, reverse it. Thank you.
I am not drinking at all really. A couple of beers on the 4th of July & a session of Dirty Pictionary... that was enjoyable, although I seem to have identified myself to everyone around as one of the clear leaders for the local leach/debaucher king.
Oh well.
*Sugar Bullets - Stuart Davis*

So, quick updates before story time.
If you have not checked out Goodreads.com, please do and link to me. I was being quite a little voracious reader before The Wife arrived and I got bogged down in Johnathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. If you can't find me, I don't know why.

I have been encouraged to participate in Twitter, which feels quite a bit like PARTI and ISCA did back in the old days. A nice piece of nostalga from college.

The Wife has established a facebook.com account... I occasionally make her throw things or give people flair over there.

I am jones-ing for a real game. The last thing I played was Notre Dame with S & T (brother of S, but not that S.) I certainly haven't played Arkham in several months and keep being jelouse of Binder playing it all the freakin' time!!
*Hey You - Pink Floyd The Wall*

I have been happy with my upgraded potential for artists I want to see, but am tourqued off that all of the artists which I want to see are making swings through Iowa at this time. FUCK! Although Cowboy Mouth cancelled their show at Gabe's/The Picador. Probably a good thing.
*God Is A Bullet - Concrete Blonde*

Story: So, The Wife's birthday (and subsequent expiration of her driver's license) was the sunday after the move in. We were damned if we were going to go deal with TX DPS while we had friends in town who carried my boxes of crap up the stairs. A quote from I, "Shawn, your games are no longer fun" and "this box? It is filled with nothing but Europe albumns."

Fuck him, but I love him too.
Anyway, so on the Monday after her birthday, we toddle into TX DPS, where they say, "Oh, this expired yesterday. You will now need to take the written and driving tests in order to get a TX license."
No amount of logic for the situation will overcome the bureaucracy of a state which has not yet learned from other states (Example: the citizens of the state of Illinois successfully sued the government when it kept a toll-road open longer than the stated 'to pay for itself'...this is the standard for toll-roads in this state.)
So, The Wife has a plan... I will not divulge it here until it works or fails.
*New York Apartment - Bill Hicks*

Reviews:
No spoilers attached.
*Gorilla, You're a Desperado - Warren Zevon*

Hellboy II: The Goldern Army
Nice, very nice. Two thumbs up, full price in theather, DVD ownership.

IronMan:
Hell YES!
GREAT. Two thumbs up, full price in theather, DVD ownership on release possibly & willing to re-see at full price.

The Incredible Hulk:
Nice, although the chemistry between Ed Norton & Liv Tyler was a little off...
It certainly has scoured the bulk of Ang Lee's version away.
Still a thumb & DVD ownership.
*Hell Yeah - The Bloodhound Gang*

Indian Jones & the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull:
Nice. Renard complains about the writers being lazy with Marion Ravenwood during certain fights, but I believe he is being overly critical and forgetting the whole genre of High Adventure where this happens.
Still a thumb & DVD ownership. I saw it twice because the wife asked.
*As a note to the SMOG crowd out there: I thought of it first, or at least plotted it out first.*

The Dark Knight:
Despite Mike saying "Dark Knight did not cure the common cold, but it did provide significant male enhancement." I loved this.
The movie is 2.5 hours long... and seems to feel like Superman Returns about 2 hours in, but it is still a great ride.
Two thumbs up, full price, DVD ownership soon after release.
*Shadows of the Night - Pat Benatar*

and before the final story...
Mama Mia:
OK. I agree with Terance Stamp in _Pricilla Queen of the Desert_ "No more fucking ABBA!"
I grew up when that was considered popular music. I know all of the words & the songs.
I still liked the movie.
It is a diabetic coma causing, sugar-laden, musical which isn't the best in the last 10 years.
*Roland Choral - Warren Zevon*

But it doesn't take itself seriously and has touches for those with some college or good high school education. (When was the last time you saw a movie make a joke about a greek chorus?)
It is funny, nasty, well produced & generally well done.
*Hooked On A Feeling - Blue Swede*

Pierce Brosnan gets my "Sir Oliver Reed" award for the musical.
For those who don't get my obscure reference, watch the movie version of "Tommy"
Sir Oliver Reed plays the step-father and if you can carry half of a tune in a bucket, you will understand.

Story: On last friday, after I was done with work, we went to a local resturaunt & then to the theather, to find all of the showings of The Dark Knight sold out until 11:30. The Wife 'stamped her pretty pink foot' and asked with the cute pouty-lip to see Mama Mia.
I expected that this would occur and figured better bite the bullet now & pre-pay the karma.
*When I Win - Gaelic Storm*
We noticed that the theater was a little warm when we were let in, but I thought it was residual heat from the previous crowd.
10 minutes before the trailers begin, the management wanders in letting everyone in the fully packed theater know that they knew the AC was broken, it wasn't going to get better & we had a choice.
A) leave and get comp tickets for a future showing of the show.
B) stay and get comp tickets for a future show of our choice.

The Wife said we could tough it out & we stayed... so karma paid off with a free showing of The Dark Knight the next day with primo seats since we arrive 1.5 hours before the show to stand in line and were let in with no line. *BWAHAHAHAHAH!*

Oh, I suspect that a lot of my pleasure at the movie was for the Watchman trailer, which looked AWESOME.

Now, my inital statement about the movie, since I am certain my opinion on the trailer/movie's existence will be unpopular.
*The Apple - Bill Cosby*
First: for those of you who have read the INCREDIBLY GOOD WORK of Allan Moore, let me ask you a question.
*Deep Cut - Local H*

How much of the true genius of this work did you catch or get in the first reading? 50%? 60%?
How much more did you appreciate it in the second and subsequent readings? More?
How many people do you believe will seek out the graphic novel as the result of seeing the movie & appreciate more the great subtleties on their readings? A decent number in my opinion... which will make more people enjoy the work more.
Anything wrong with that?
If you haven't read the graphic novel, get thee to a comic store heathens.

Alright, enough for now.
Discuss amongst yourselves.
Next, a small advertisement before plotting.

Moved...

Mon, 05 May 2008 01:46:26 GMT

Ok, so I have at least been consistent with my updates.. sorry all.

Well, as of a week + 3 days ago, I left the shelter of S&S's house, nice people they are and due RSN, and landed at the new abode of Cheaps1utsaviour & her boi. My goal while here is to stay out of the way (which I hear that I am doing a good job at) and to continue to pay my way with favors, house painting & other sundry tasks.

Actually, my long term goal here is to make this the last place I have to stay before moving to a residence of my own. I deeply appreciate generosity which has been extended by my hosts, but I don't think that I could make the move to another house again. It is too disruptive to too many people...

Work: I am making progress at learning more and more about how these things interact.
To give a comparison or thought, about 6 months ago I had honestly been toying with the idea of taking up some esoteric study like watch-making or clock-making just to give me something crazy to do.
Not anymore.

In this position, the phrase "a lot of moving parts" keeps getting used in reference to the things which we need to watch, review, monitor & generally keep track of. It is absolutely correct and has cured me of my desire to tinker with anything terribly detailed for quite sometime.

Social life:
I get to occasionally take trips in the area as Cheaps1utsaviour & the Boi are quite helpful in directing me around, except to WalMart, which seems to allude me.
I went with them on a recent dinner outing, to which I thank them again, and they have been pretty cool about my questions.

Other than that, I miss my wife.

I will get to see her soon though, as she is coming down here for a weekend soon! For the family day celebration by the company. Six Flags!

We has an offer on the house which was dependent on an FHA loan, which was denied for no apparent reason. The woman who made the offer is making an appeal for the property, but we won't hear about that for several weeks.

Beyond that, I am treading water.
I have read my way through about half of the Discworld series since getting down here.

Soon, if things don't change, I will have to make some horrible decisions about life and what I will do with it. Either I will have to get another job in order to pay the rent, the mortgage & living expenses, or I will have to surrender my job and move back to Iowa.

I don't know which I will be happier with.
I really like the job, but the stress of living in two states is beginning to wear on me and missing my wife.
I guess that if I surrendered my job that I could live with going back on the phone for a bit, which I am certain a move back to the Iowa office would entail.
But I really worked pretty hard to get off the phone, I would hate to go back to it.

Hopefully it won't come to that.

Talk to you all again soon.

"Tell as story from Texas..."

Sun, 24 Feb 2008 22:04:32 GMT

That was the request I recently received from a friend in Iowa.

When I say that I mean about two weeks ago, which is not a statement about this friend, but a commentary about me and my life.

I have things to talk about, but at this time none of them qualify as a story. Nothing as grand as the fire-hydrant, no bellboy stories, no skinny dipping in Lower City Park during a flood after a night of sexual debauchery, no terrible stories of customer service gone horribly wrong infuriating me, and certainly no litany of real or perceived wrongs which have been perpetrated on my by the vagaries of fate/God/karma.

As it happens, I am sitting here in a friend's house using the computer for one thing when I really should be using it for another (a small story in that) missing the things which I would be doing in Iowa City this weekend.

This weekend is GAMICON in IC, which for the last several years I have had the ~~insanity~~ pleasure to be on the committee for organizing. If nothing else, the pictures from the above site are helping me see what I am missing.

So, for two of the last three years I have taken the friday of this week off (generally also corresponding with the disbursement of the profit-sharing checks for the big G) and celebrated my previous years work by cashing a check, getting a few things done before the convention and then working registration, gaming my butt off and generally have a good time with extended friends by being geeks.
This also means that for several years running I have had a small stand-up routine during the auction which the convention puts on by being the auctioneer and helping people purchase products which they didn't know that they wanted for completely novel reasons.
This weekend is normally about me spending money on a gaming hobby which I love and generally treating myself like crap, but never involving myself in the weird illnesses which seem to swarm around the convention.

This year, I am in Dallas wishing I was in Iowa... which is a feeling which I have had consistently for the last month and a half. This time it is a little harder though.

So, I am sitting here listening to psuedo-punk-irish music, trying to pull myself out of a funk and avoid having to complete Continuing Education credits for my job...

Small story:
So, I keep trying to tell people at work that I don't want to change certain things since I don't have a permanent address in Texas, and still own property in Iowa.
This got promptly ignored by several people, who are really only trying to do their jobs, but which has complicated my life.

To be an insurance agent, it isn't enough to learn everything about the process, contracts and general handling of things, but you need to keep abreast of changes and information about the industry.
And like nurses, we need to complete Continuing Education courses. In Iowa it is 36 hours over 3 years (now about to change to less in a smaller period of time) half classroom, half self-study. Well, I finished all of this up before I got the new job... making myself legal in Iowa for another 3 years.

So, the rules are different for each state, but generally states will offer licenses to non-residents if they are 1) licensed with their home state and 2) willing to pay for the license. Some stated require licenses to do anything with a policy for their state, others just care that you are licensed at all, it depends on the state.
Texas cares a little, requiring licenses for anyone making changes to Texas policies.
The licensing department here in Dallas applied to get my non-resident Texas license changed to a resident license, despite me repeatedly saying, "but I am not living in Texas yet... I am staying with friends... it isn't exactly the same thing."
Well, they are probably right to have ignored me, but in the end....
The state of Texas requires that insurance Continuing Education credits be completed before mid-March each year... 30 hours of such... half Classroom, half self-study. And since I have just been provided a license before the deadline, I need to complete the education to keep the damned thing.
Had they not moved me yet, then I wouldn't be stuck with this.
Had they moved me after March, then I would have a year for this...
but no... they moved me back in January, and just got informed this last week about it.
FUCK!

So I really should be doing CEs right now, but don't want to be.

Other than that, I have been pretty consistent in driving back and forth to work, sleeping, eating, reading and generally being a bump on a couch playing Guitar Hero.

I am finding my way around Dallas more and more... god thank Mapquest (I was required to return the GPS to D a month ago as he needed it this weekend, and it wasn't charging properly.)
I have learned to hate Dallas drivers since they rush to stop as quickly as possible.

I have also seen my wife in the last week, which was a nice surprise from my In-Laws which has been entitled my birthday, Christmas and other presents for the year. It was a great Valentine's Day gift and included the day off from work on Friday from my boss (whom The Wife had been in contact with about the surprise.)
I paid for it the next week at work by being way behind, but it was worth it.

As for work, I have spent the last month and a half feeling like the slow kid in class. I keep being told that I should expect to feel confused and behind for the next year, but I don't like that at all and want to be better at my job. But some days it is like being a new butler at the Winchester Mystery House and being constantly told to go get some minutia from X room... and then after bringing it back, being told to go get something different from another room. No directions, only the map from 5 years ago and your co-workers for help.
A little frustrating, but I am working through it.

Other than the things above, I have been trying to help people in the area... help S&S with home improvements to 'pay the rent', helping Cheaps1utsavior and her Boi paint for three nights straight, reading the whole of the Harry Potter series finally, etc. etc. etc.

I will send more notes when I can manage it.

Oh, and if you are interested, check out Goodreads.com for way to find more books, things you are interested in, or another way to keep up with people.

Anyone want a house?

Fri, 11 Jan 2008 00:50:09 GMT

Nope, not kidding.

Let me back up a bit.

I like the company for which I work. I have for quite a while. There are certain quirks about working for them, but having worked for other companies with worse 1) business plans 2) goals 3) management 4) corporate structures 5) salaries and 6) benefits....I would have to indicate that the big G works for me.
It doesn't work for everyone, but it does work for me.

Part of the problem with the office in Iowa is that it lacks for job opportunities unless you are wanting to be a Supervisor or Manager of some sort. There are certainly a few jobs which are neither of those, nor their underlings (read: phone associates) but those jobs are currently filled with people who certainly count themselves lucky that they got them and no longer answer a phone all of the time.
The two lovely people in licensing
The two guys on the LAN team
The two people in the command center (see footnote)
The building maintenance man
The Training supervisor & two trainers
The 3 HR specialists and HR manager
The executive assistance to the Office Director
The Monitoring Team (which I am a member of only because I used to be a member of them, was taken off for an extended project and then cobbled back with them in a weird way.)
The consistancy person/agent (who has sort of collected her job in a manner similar to me, but with harder fighting, more acceptance and more credit.)
So, like 20 people in a building with approx 250-300 employees in it.

*looks around*
Hmmmm... either I wouldn't do that person's job if you paid me, which you would have to do when they would be gone and I took it, or I like the people in the jobs that are cool too much to kill them off...
[Footnote: Technically, I could have gotten one of the Command Center jobs, but a friend had been downsized previously out one of those positions, so I hadn't felt secure about the job post when it appeared 4 months after he left the company, it seemed to be...uncertain.}

So, occasionally I look at the Job Post board to see what is available in other offices which are bigger and have more opportunity...in a "see what you are missing by not being willing to move" sort of way, 'cause I love Iowa.

Well, around Halloween, there was a Job Post for something which just screamed me...
and I posted for it.
and I got it...in Dallas, Texas.
Well, shit.
Now I have to move...and only 6 months after purchasing a nice Condo in North Liberty.
Before I posted for the job I talked to The Wife, who was astoundingly supportive (I love her SOOOO much) saying, "I will go where ever you are. I know that you are not really happy with your current job and if moving away from my friends and family is what it takes for you to be happy at work then I will do it." - (a slight paraphrase there, but not much of one.)

So, here we are a couple of months later.
Anyone know anyone who wants a nice Condo in North Liberty? Still under the builders warrenty?

The Wife is currently in the state of Iowa, while I drove down to Texas on January 5th & 6th in order to start work on the 7th.
I am currently staying with the friend mentioned in the footnote above and his wife (lovely people, we will call them S&S) until one of a few things happens.
1) The Condo sells, The Wife gets the movers to load everything into the truck, she takes the cats and arrives at the apartment which we are going to rent after the Condo sells.
2) The female in S&S mentioned above enters her 3rd trimester (yes, they are pregnant with a little girl) and birth is immanent. They are paying back a friend who helped them with housing when they needed it since even with the raise The Wife and I can't afford a mortgage & rent at the same time. (Not that I really know how much I am making now...I just know that it is a raise.)
3) I get tired of the commute, which I am slightly frightened of, and inform The Wife that I will take a second job in order to afford the Mortgage and Rent.
4) There could be a four, but I don't know what it is.

The commute from S&S's house to work is 32 miles, but through some terrible locations, like past the DFW airport and the horrible State Highways 114 & 121... which by themselves are not bad, but they intersect in a very inelegant way with Interstate Highway 635, resulting in terrible traffic jams.

My solution for this? Wake up at 5:30 AM in order to get on the road by 6:15 to drive in relatively light traffic to make it to work by 7 AM.
7 Fucking AM!!!

I am more of a night person, staying up until 3 AM is more my speed.
Shit.

But, 4 days running, I have done this thing.
And 7 out of the 8 trips is has been great.. 35-50 minutes in commute, nothing horrible, no accidents to me or my person.

Today, not so much. Standstill traffic for over 15 minutes until I turned and took advantage of the interstate exit nearby which was totally in the wrong direction, but which got me home before the traffic had started moving again.

I must thank now another friend who moved to the area a few months ago, we will call him D, who loaned me his GPS in order to help me learn my way around. Today, worth it all.

Anyway... I will post when the house is sold.
I will post when I miss my family & family of friends in Iowa.
I will post when I know more and have a place to live that isn't S&S's.
I will post of the expected trips back to Iowa, one in June for a friend's wedding, one for ICON.

I will post when I have answered Johnny's question about Track 1, Side 1.

But I will be happy with the job, because it has cost me to make it happen.

Update update update

Sun, 10 Jun 2007 19:13:42 GMT

Hello all.. today I will be providing a soundtrack for the entry... follow along if you are able.

Moving: [Creature Comforted - Local H from _Here Comes the Zoo_]

I hate moving.
I hate the process of re-collecting my sprawl of stuff which I have secreted around my living space, reviewing it for relevance and having to cart it from one location to another. It forces me to analyze how materialistic I have become, which makes me sick to my stomach. I should be able to live simpler than this.
It also forces me to realize how much of a sentimental ass I am. I should not have to have heated discussions with my wife over the value of keeping things from high school, but then I shouldn't have so much of an attachment to little notes from my first girlfriends which I haven't read since the last time I stumbled upon them.
I hate this, but then pretty much everyone is resistance to self reflection which shows the baggage of the past. We try to live our lives in such a way that we don't have to look at the mess that we are training in our wake...*gah*

I also will interject that when I get into these moods that I hate the pompous air which I take... as if I have the answers.
Perhaps today all I have is the best view of my general problems.

Maybe it is that moving forces me to see all of the projects and intentions which I have built up and failed to finish or complete.

Predictably, I hate the inevitable review of decisions for things which I have been happy. Things like utilities and services to my house. Previous readers of this blog will remember my previous sarabande with QWEST over the phone line and internet connection when moving to this location 2 years prior.

Now I get to move out of their area of influence to somewhere else with people whom, at first glance, seem to believe that customer service is something which the customer does for themselves. Brilliant.
Also I get to review the decisions which lead to me deciding that MediaCom and their billing/corporate policies routinely lick the sweat off of a dead man's balls.
Luckily, The Wife understands me in this manner and hasn't explored that option at all.

But having to pack brings me back to my next problem....

Daydreams: [Of Wolf and Man - Metallica from S&M]
This is the local comic shop.
In moving obviously I have to collect the small piles of comics laying about the house, more specifically the media room and closet, and put them into the boxes.
This reminds me of the current hassling problem which I am having with these, previously quite good but now sucking a-holes.
In my links I have Mike Oliveri's blog, listed as a link.
I like to fancy Mike a friend, but I know that we have only been in each others presence a few times and that it is my honor to have been introduced to him by a mutual friend... so to call him such is an exaggeration on my part. Mostly because he is a good writer who has been published. My sickness of trying to name drop and socially climb. So sue me.

Regardless, Mike got a gig as a writer for a horror comic called Werewolves: Call of the Wild.
My thought was SWEET!!!
I followed the instructions that he put on his site for assuring that I would get the two copies that I wanted, one for me and one for Tim which involved printing out an order form with the order number on it and presenting it to the counter monkey at the store.
I did this, and made it clear that I wanted it added to my pull list.

As perhaps you can see, these books came out over a year ago and have been put into a Trade Bound copy since then.
Number of copies that I have? ZERO

Now, I know that I am not their largest buyer of books. I know that I am only a small percentage of their total yearly gross.
I probably drop somewhere in the neighborhood of $700 a year at the store.
HOWEVER...I have a big mouth and I have been a loyal customer for quite a while...somewhere in the mid-90's is when I started getting books again.
So, after my third discussion/yelling session at the current version of the counter-monkey about how pissed I was that 6 months later I STILL didn't have the books that I had ordered... I told them the following.
"If I come back and ask for these books again and don't have them, I will take my existing pull list that is due you, and stop purchasing from you. I will also let everyone know why you suck."

Again, The Wife loves me, and since that time has repeatedly called them asking if this book is in my waiting box, reminding them of this promise. Each time she leaves her phone# so that she can get a call when the book comes in.
She has never gotten a call from them.

So, in having to clean up my comics, I am steeling myself for the inevitable trip to this store in which I yell again at the person behind the counter, have to yell at people I have known for many years for sucking, have to call the owner who I have known for several years and talked about this with during last years Zombie March and tell him that I will not be returning.

Some days I hate working in Customer Service.

Work: [Once - Pearl Jam from Ten]

So, last year we were making progress on Quality percentages... we had just added a metric to the monthly scorecards to be a kicker in the goals for the year... I had presented that portion of the goals package talking about how WE WOULD REVIEW 3 POLICIES A DAY FOR THIS GOAL!!

Then on January 3rd of the year, I get told to stop performing QC.
I blinked a few times, but like my new boss and decided to not push it...

In April, after 4 months of not doing this, I get told to start again.
Amazingly enough, our numbers hadn't improved at all and there are people in the office who are resistant to the feedback that they were given.
"When were we trained in this?"
"Why is this wrong?"
"I think this is completely unfair, I don't remember being trained for this and it doesn't make any sense."
FUCK OFF!
I trained it to you...We have always done it this way and amazingly enough, contract law doesn't have much leeway when it comes to being completely correct and being wrong.
Then I get an assistant... who wants to argue with me for the same things and doesn't have the work ethic/drive which is needed for us to stay up to speed on the project.

Then Excel reaches its limit and we have to move to Access... which I dislike anyway, but which I am only passingly familiar with. We spend a week trying to shift things from Excel to Access and use Access properly, and he gets sidetracked with a side-project to make a program to access Access rather than using the Forms included in the fucking program...which puts us a week behind and then he goes on vacation for a week.
*ARRGGG*

Fucking fuck fuck....

*deep breath* [Too Sick to Pray - Alabama 3 from Gone in Sixty Seconds]
So there are a few reasons why I haven't posted a while... work honestly is the one which is the largest reasons.
Since the middle of April I have been getting approx 25 hours of overtime on each check, which always makes my mood foul. Because it again focuses me on projects and goals which I haven't completed... like school and drains me from having to walk through peoples shit each day and tell them to clean it up.
Also I feel bad ~~talking~~ bitching about work when I know that it can be worse.
1) I could be unemployed
2) I could be collecting trash
3) I could be working at McDonald's again.

I also dislike talking about my problems at work because of the colleges of mine who might still read my blog and have different problems/difficulties at work, or the ex-colleges of mine who might still read my blog for whom I wish the world could be different.
And work is the majority of what I have been thinking about lately...
I am halfway done with a short story which I like, I can't work on it.
I have to get my thoughts down for the three game ideas in my head, I can't concentrate on them.
I have to move within 2 months... I don't want to clean.
I have to get a couple of projects done for my wife's 30th Birthday party and can't get the motivation to do them.
I have to tell stories to move plot along...

LARP:
I agreed to come temporarily back to the Iowa City Werewolf LARP for One World By Night, because I had started plots which people wanted to pursue... and they were big enough plots that they shouldn't just be ignored by the game...

However, I allowed myself to be drawn back into the politics of the stupid and dumb people who gravitate to this variation of Role Playing.
Now I am almost just wanting to shorten the stories their proper life and breadth just to have my life back without these complications... but I won't do that.

Ending:[I Just Want You - Ozzy Osbourne from Ozzmosis]

So, having vented my spleen, I need to thank a few people for a few things in the last few months:
The Wife: Support and arguments and motivation.
The Colleges: for help at work when I have asked for it... I truly appreciate it each time.
The Sunday night movie crew: Although I occasionally take a pasting for my taste in movies, I do enjoy the gathering and the food.
The Monday Gaming group: The slight scheduled reality break is needed each week.
Val: For poking me about this and being appreciative of the things I do.
Lindsay: for recipes and also being a small poke about this...
Johnny and Jen: For being good role models for a new couple. Someday I hope for a toilet of my own. :-)
Jason: for the distraction, despite my distraction from the distraction... and the recursion of this... we will get the weekend soon after the house.

Thank you all.

Small movie review:
Knocked Up:
Great movie... quite funny. Not what you expect, not a chick flick, not a guy flick, but a great movie.
Although seeing a baby crowning wasn't what I needed at that moment. *chuckle*

Movie Meme total=225

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 05:28:31 GMT

From some guy’s LJ (see where surfing gets you?):

Take this list and post it into your own LJ, and bold the movies you’ve seen. Add five more movies to the end of the list. Count how many movies you have seen. If you’ve seen more than 70 movies, you are a “movie whore”. Post the score of how many movies you’ve seen in the subject line. Use a LJ-cut since you’ve got at least one LJ-friend who doesn’t really want to see an ungodly number of movies snaking its way down the computer monitor.

Please note, this is from Jason's blog and I believe that the 70 movie limit is WAAAAY too low now.

1. Napoleon Dynamite
2. Saw
3. White Noise
4. White Oleander
5. Anger Management
6. 50 First Dates
7. Jason
8. Scream
9. Scream 2
10. Scream 3
11. Scary Movie
12. Scary Movie 2
13. Scary Movie 3
14. American Pie
15. American Pie 2
16. American Wedding
17. Harry Potter
18. Harry Potter 2
19. Harry Potter 3
20. Resident Evil I
21. Resident Evil 2 (aka RE: Apocalypse)
22. The Wedding Singer
23. Little Black Book
24. The Village
25. Donnie Darko
26. Lilo & Stitch
27. Finding Nemo
28. Finding Neverland
29. 13 Ghosts
30. Signs
31. The Grinch
32. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (The Original)
33. White Chicks
34. Butterfly Effect
35. 13 going on 30
36. I, Robot
37. Dodgeball
38. Universal Soldier
39. A Series Of Unfortunate Events
40. Along Came A Spider
41. Deep Impact
42. Kingpin
43. Never Been Kissed
44. Meet The Parents
45. Meet The Fockers
46. Eight Crazy Nights
47. A Cinderella Story
48. The Terminal
49. The Lizzie McGuire Movie
50. Passport to Paris
51. Dumb & Dumber
52. Dumb & Dumberer
53. Final Destination
54. Final Destination 2
55. Halloween
56. Halloween 2
57. Halloween 3
58. Halloween 4
59. Halloween 5
60. H20
61. Halloween: the Resurrection
62. The Ring
63. The Ring 2
64. Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle
65. Practical Magic
66. Chicago
67. Ghost Ship
68. From Hell
69. Team America: World Police
70. Hellboy
71. Secret Window
72. I Am Sam
73. The Whole Nine Yards
74. The Day After Tomorrow
75. Child’s Play
76. Bride of Chucky
77. Ten Things I Hate About You
78. Just Married
79. Gothika
80. A Nightmare on Elm Street
81. Sixteen Candles
82. Bad Boys 2
83. Joy Ride
84. Seven
85. Oceans Eleven
86. Oceans Twelve
87. Identity
88. Lone Star
89. Bedazzled
90. Predator
91. Predator II
92. Independence Day
93. Cujo
94. A Bronx Tale
95. Darkness Falls
96. Christine
97. ET
98. Children of the Corn
99. My Boss’ Daughter
100. Maid in Manhattan
101. Frailty
102. Best Bet
103. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
104. She’s All That
105. Calendar Girls
106. Sideways
107. Mars Attacks
108. Event Horizon
109. Ever After
110. Forrest Gump
112. Big Trouble in Little China
113. X-Men
114. X-Men 2
115. Jeepers Creepers
116. Jeepers Creepers 2
117. Catch Me If You Can
118. The Others
119. Freaky Friday
120. Reign of Fire
121. Man on Fire
122. Braveheart
123. Cruel Intentions
124. The Hot Chick
125. Swimfan
126. Miracle
127. Friday Night Lights
128. Old School
129. Ray
130. The Notebook
131. K-Pax
132. Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
133. Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
134. Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
135. A Walk to Remember
136. Sweet Home Alabama
137. Moulin Rouge
138. Boogeyman
139. Hitch
140. Back Door Sluts 9
141. The Fifth Element
142. Star Wars Episode I
143. Star Wars Episode II
144. Star Wars Episode IV
145. Star Wars Episode V
146. Star Wars Episode VI
147. Troop Beverly Hills
148. Swimming with Sharks
149. Trainspotting
150. People under the stairs
151. Blue Velvet
152. The Sound of Music
153. Parent Trap
154. The Burbs
155. SLC Punk
156. Meet Joe Black
157. Wild Girls
158. A Clockwork Orange
159. The Order
160. Spiderman
161. Spiderman 2
162. Amelie
163. Mean Girls
164. Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen
165. Shrek
166. Shrek 2
167. The Incredibles
168. Collateral
169. The Fast & The Furious
170. 2 Fast 2 Furious
171. Sky Captain & The World of Tomorrow
172. Closer
173. The Sixth Sense
174. Artificial Intelligence
175. Love, Actually
176. The Sweetest Thing
177. Shutter
178. Ella Enchanted
179. Princess Diaries 1
180. Princess Diaries 2
181. The Breakfast Club
182. October Sky
183. Remember the Titans
184. Titanic
185. Boondock Saints
186. American History X
187. Fight Club
188. Heavenly Creatures
189. Stealing Beauty
190. Like Water For Chocolate
191. Powwow Highway
192. Secretary
193. But I’m A Cheerleader
194. I <3 Huckabees
195. Ripley’s Game
196. Coffee And Cigarettes
197. Taxi Driver
198. Silence Of The Lambs
199. The Exorcist
200. If Lucy Fell
201. Lady Jane
201. When Harry Met Sally
202. Me, Myself & Irene
203. Kung Fu Hustle
204. Sin City
205. Labyrinth
206. Much Ado About Nothing
207. The Cowboy Way
208. Paulie
209. Blazing Saddles
210. Galaxy Quest
211. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead
212. Citizen Kane
213. You Can Count on Me
214. Young Frankenstein
215. Raiders of the Lost Ark
216. Starman
217. St. Elmos Fire
218. Coyote Ugly
219. The Other Sister
220. Rainman
221. Little Shop of Horrors
222. Chasing Amy
223. House of Sand and Fog
224. Mildred Pierce
225. The Big Lebowski
226. Mallrats
227. Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
228. The Goonies
229. Starsky & Hutch
230. Saved!
231. The Upside of Anger
232. Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song
233. The Cat’s Meow
234. The Rutles
235. Waking Ned Devine
236. Pirates of the Caribbean
237. Little Women
238. Huck Finn
239. National Treasure
240. O Brother Where Art Thou?
241. Dick
242. Howard the Duck
243. Garden State
244. Hero
245. Spinal Tap
246. Almost Famous
247. Before Sunrise
248. Before Sunset
249. Troy
250. Gone With The Wind
251. Chocolat
252. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
253. Now and Then
254. Romeo and Juliet
255. Ferris Bueler’s Day Off
256. Grease
257. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?
258. Mr. North
259. The African Queen
260. The Wizard of Oz
261. Country Girl
262. The Philadelphia Story
263. Bringing Up Baby
264. The Aviator
265. An Affair to Remember
266. Sabrina (any version)
267. Holiday
268. Conspiracy Theory
269. Stage Door
270. Rigaletto
271. White Christmas
272. Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
273. The Wedding Planner
274. Arsenic and Old Lace
275. A Day at the Races
276. Willy Wonka
277. Bend it Like Beckham
278. Star Wars Episode III
279. A Beautiful Mind
280. Urban Legend
281. Dead Poet’s Society
282. Kill Bill vol. 1
283. Kill Bill vol. 2
284. The Royal Tenenbaums
285. The Life Aquatic
286. American Beauty
287. A Chorus Line
288. Iron Jawed Angels
289. Phantom of the Opera
290. A League of their Own
291. Stuart Little
292. Notting Hill
293. A Lot Like Love
294. Along Came Polly
295. Billy Madison
296. Happy Gilmore
297. A Hard Day’s Night
298. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
299. The Motorcycle Diaries
300. Y Tu Mama Tambien
301. Bokura no War Game
302. Raise Your Voice
303. The Birds
304. Camp Nowhere
305. Billy Elliot
306. Anchorman
307. The Crow
308. *62
309. Queen Of The Damned
310. Jumanji
311. Gattaca
312. Benny and Joon
313. Tank Girl
314. Monty Python: The Meaning of Life
315. A Knight’s Tale
316. Anastasia
317. Unconditional Love
318. Casablanca
319. About A Boy
320. Bridget Jones’s Diary
321. Bridget Jones’s Diary: The Edge of Reason
322. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
323. House of Flying Daggers
324. Legally Blonde
325. Sense and Sensibility
326. School of Rock
327. It Could Happen to You
328. Wilde
329. Dark City
330. Home Fries
331. House Arrest
332. Leon: The Professional
333. You Can’t Take It With You
334. Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
335. Singin’ in the Rain
336. Ball of Fire
337. Double Indemnity
338. Lethal Weapon
339. Free Willy
340. Nick of Time
341. Edward Scissorhands
342. Cry-baby
343. Red Shoe Diaries
344. Gleaming the Cube
345. Donovan’s Reef
346. Girls Just Want to Have Fun
347. Wimbledon
348. Dog Soldiers
349. The 13th Warrior
350. Memento
351. Rollerball (Original Version)
352. Stigmata
353. Meet Me in St. Louis
354. Serendipity
355. Dogma
356. Legend
357. Dangerous Beauty
358. The Unsaid
359. The Grudge
360. Sleepy Hollow
361. American Psycho
362. Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan
363. Clue
364. Velvet Goldmine
365. The Worst Witch
366. Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland
367. Hackers
368. Tuff Turf
369. The Bride
370. Lost Boys
371. The Cell
372. Pretty in Pink
373. The Dark Crystal
374. Contact
375. The Matrix
376. The Matrix Reloaded
377. The Matrix Revolutions
378. The Bourne Indentity
379. The Bourne Surpemacy
380. Breakfast at Tiffany’s
381. Twister
382. Run Lola Run
383. The Mummy
384. The Mummy Returns
385. The Lion King
386. The Club
387. What’s Eating Gilbert Grape?
388. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
389. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
390. The Princess Bride
391. My Man Godfrey
392. The Thin Man
393. Lost in Translation
394. Equilibrium
395. Sleuth
396. Gladiator
397. The Last of the Mohicans
398. The Gate
399. To Wong Foo: Thanks for everything, Julie Newmar
400. The Rocky Horror Picture Show
401. Firestarter
402. ConAir
403. The Killer
404. The Stormriders
405. Once Upon A Time In The West
406. A Man Called Hero
407. Fargo
408. Freeway
409. Little Man Tate
410. Miss Firecracker
411. A Mighty Wind
412. Best In Show
413. Brazil
414. 12 Monkeys
415. Time Bandits
416. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
417. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen
418. Serenity
419. Daredevil
420. Syriana
421. The Shadow
422. Dune
423. Night Watch
424. Underworld
425. Superman Returns

426. M*A*S*H

427. The Quiet Man

428. The Prestige

429. My Life

430. Strange Days BTW: I am trying to do this behind the cut-text, but seems to be having problems with it, please let me know hot to correct this.

Updates

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 06:56:57 GMT

So, we will start with the simple things:

About 2 months ago The Wife fell.
Now, when I call it a fall, I really mean tumbled down a flight of stairs. 13 of 14 possible stairs not taking in a conventional manner.

Exciting, nerve wracking.

When I arrived on the scene, I was not understanding why she was sitting at Nigel's with an icepack on her head.
3 hours, 2 x-rays and 1 CAT scan later, the bruises beginning to develop on her lower back, we leave the hospital.
I had a slight amount of residual guilt over this occurrence, since she was going to Nigel's to deliver me food and a small gift after our annoying argument over the phone earlier in the day.

Honestly, I can't really remember what it was that we were arguing over, which I am pretty certain how it should be.
The only two lasting effects of this, 1) that The Wife is now about 3 incidents with high-heels away from being permanently barred from these dangerous and deadly devices. 2) a good story about how my friends care for me and The Wife. After the last phone call reporting on her condition to the friends who were gaming without me, Nigel reportedly, in a straight dead-pan said, "Well, I haven't examined the damage to the floor, but I don't think that we will be suing."
Referring of course to the location where The Wife's head bounced off the carpeted concrete floor.

I love my friends.

Next point: My temporary project at work has ended.
Pretty much on time with the prediction made earlier in the year, which speaks well to me of how my primary manager will keep his promises (and by extension threats) which gives me some level of job security. Rather certainty that the rug will not be pulled out from underneath me.

Although my previous boss was fired one day while I was on vacation, which was pretty damn jarring.

Now, back to monitoring and making people's lives terrible with minutia.

Next point: The Wife and I have started the process of purchasing a house. Well, actually the proper way to phrase this is that we have signed, placed earnest money, and started picking out the appliances, colors for cabinetry, flooring, counter-tops and paint for a place which will be finished for our occupancy by July 1st, with an expected signing and closing date in late May.

This is exciting, although it moves me one more step closer on the path to becoming a father at some point in the future, which really messes with my head.

I am however happy that I am about to become a home owner, small stresses and all.

Next point: the rumors of ICON's demise have been exaggerated. I have had a few simple and small conversations with some people about how to avoid this yearly panic over the last ICON in the future, and my suggestions have been met with sympathetic ears. I have heard rumors of several people being displeased, in what I consider very perverse ways, that they have failed in killing the convention. I truly suspect that it is the serving of egg on their face when their rather dire predictions of the end have failed to come to fruition, yet again, being uncomfortable.

I am certain these stresses that the convention has undergone are going to reshape and reforge it into something different than I have seen in the past, but change is inevitable.

Next point: I have allowed myself to be re-drawn back into the morass of activity which is LARP-ing in the central Iowa area. I am trying to maintain a different level of interaction between myself, the organizations and people involved in the games. Currently, I am naught but a simple player who is getting annoyed enough with the idiots wandering around (almost an IOWA joke there) to threaten violence in their general direction. Soon however, I believe that I will be re-assuming a mantle of Storyteller in what I predict will be a temporary duty.
Why am I doing this? Because a friend has asked me to, the same reason why I have ended up doing many things in my life.

Oh well, for a short time it has been comfortable to place the mantle of bob back on my shoulders. Soon I will be putting Brett's facade back on again, which will be a more tailored and much closer to my own face.

But before that occurs, there will be much discussion about the ground rules and where this will go.

Next Point: Van Halen and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

I think that many people know that I have a favorite band. They finally got into the Rock and Roll Hall of fame.

I can't figure out how I feel about this.
I will however make this observation about the whole thing.... there is a clear omission which has occurred in each press release that I have seen on the honor.

Gary Cherone.

Certainly the weakest of the Van Halen albums, Van Halen III, is still a Van Halen album. If we are honoring the band, we need to even honor the crap.
Michael Anthony's web-site doesn't mention him in the thanks announcement, the Hall of Fame's announcement neglects him, the Van Halen site is down currently, DLR's site doesn't have a mention on it (this moment being the first time I have ever visited that...hopefully the last.)

Sammy's site has a recording of him on the Mark and Brian show talking about it which is fascinating and worth a listen. He also gives a miss on Gary regarding the induction, although during his little recitation of the inductee list his voice hitches a small amount, similar to a previous interview in which he was talking about an issue that resolved itself as the "I Just Can't Say Goodbye" album after his taking the singer job originally.

However, I will pay good money to see the induction ceremony and the concert that follows... someone fix me up the poor bastard without cable TV? Please, Please?

Next point: This one is a little dated, but at Icon this last year, other than getting a kick-ass pair of Alan M. Clark prints there, was resolution to the situation between Lynda and myself. I am glad that this has been resolved and that she and I are on talking/speaking terms again.

Last point: Sometime after the move is done, probably in the neighborhood of August or September, we will be having a house warming party at the new Condo. The date is uncertain because we want to have the house finished by the time people show up, but there will be a blow-out of some sort.
Everyone is invited, ask for an address closer to the date.

OK.
Night all.

Gamer Meme

Sat, 25 Nov 2006 21:12:48 GMT

You scored as Storyteller. The Storyteller is in it for the plot: the sense of mystery and the fun of participating in a narrative that has the satisfying arc of a good book or movie. He enjoys interacting with well-defined NPCs, even preferring antagonists who have genuine motivations and personality to mere monsters. To the Storyteller, the greatest reward of the game is participating in a compelling story with interesting and unpredictable plot threads, in which his actions and those of his fellow characters determine the resolution.

With apologies to Robin Laws.

What RPG Player (Not Character) Type Are You?

</td>

Storyteller

95%

Character Player

90%

Tactician

50%

Casual Gamer

50%

Power Gamer

30%

Weekend Warrior

20%

Specialist

What RPG Player (Not Character) Type Are You?
created with QuizFarm.com

Silly meme... Trix are for kids

Sun, 29 Oct 2006 23:58:03 GMT

Bold all of the following TV shows which you've ever seen 3 or more episodes of in your lifetime. Bold and Italicize a show if you're positive you've seen every episode of it. If you want, add up to 3 additional shows (keep the list in alphabetical order).

24
227
7th Heaven
A Different World
Adam-12
Aeon Flux
ALF
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Alias
Allo Allo
American Idol/Pop Idol/Canadian Idol/Australian Idol
America's Next Top Model/Germany's Next Top Model
Angel
Are You Afraid of the Dark?
Arrested Development
Baa Baa Black Sheep
Babylon 5
Babylon 5: Crusade
Barnaby Jones
Battlestar Galactica (the old one)
Battlestar Galactica (the new one)
Baywatch
Beavis & Butthead
Beverly Hills 90210
Bewitched
Bionic Woman
Bonanza
Bones
Bosom Buddies
Boston Legal
Boy Meets World
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Bug Juice
Captain Planet
Carnivale
Chappelle's Show
Charlie's Angels
Charmed
Cheers
Columbo
Commander in Chief
Coupling
Cowboy Bebop
Crossing Jordan
CSI
CSI: Miami
CSI: NY
Curb Your Enthusiasm
Dallas
Dancing with the Stars
Danny Phantom
Dark Angel
Dark Skies
Davinci's Inquest
Dawson's Creek
Dead Like Me
Deadliest Catch
Deadwood
Degrassi: The Next Generation
Designing Women
Desperate Housewives
Dharma & Greg
Different Strokes
Doctor Who (new Who)
Doctor Who (original)
Dragnet
Due South
Earth 2
Eerie, Indiana
Empty Nest
Entourage
ER
Everwood
Everybody Loves Raymond
Facts of Life
Family Guy
Family Matters
Family Ties
Farscape
Father knows best
Fawlty Towers
Felicity
Firefly
Frasier
Friends
Full House
Futurama
Get Smart
Gilligan's Island
Gilmore Girls
Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.
Green Acres
Green Wing
Grey's Anatomy
Growing Pains
Gundam Wing
Gunsmoke
Happy Days
Hart to Hart
Head of the Class
Hell's Kitchen
Hogan's Heroes
Home Improvement
Homicide: Life on the Street
House
I Dream of Jeannie
I Love Lucy
Invader Zim
Invasion
JAG
Jackass
Joey
John Doe
Just the 10 of Us
Kate & Allie
Kath and Kim
Kim Possible
Knott's Landing
LA Law
Laverne and Shirley
Little House on the Prairie
Lizzie McGuire
Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman
Lost
Lost in Space
Love, American Style
M*A*S*H
MacGyver
Major Dad
Malcolm in the Middle
Mama's Family
M.A.N.T.I.S
Married... With Children
Medium
Melrose Place
Miami Vice
Millenium
Mission: Impossible
Monk
Moonlighting
Mork & Mindy
Murphy Brown
Mr. Show with Bob and David
My Family
My Life as a Dog
My Name is Earl
My Secret Identity
My So-Called Life
My Three Sons
My Two Dads
NCIS
Night Court
Nip/Tuck
Northern Exposure
Numb3rs
Nurses
One Tree Hill
Out of This World
Oz
Perry Mason
Picket Fences
Pokemon
Power Rangers
Prison Break
Profiler
Project Runway
Psyche
Quantum Leap
Queer As Folk (US)
Queer as Folk (British)
ReGenesis
Remington Steele
Rescue Me
Road Rules
ROME
Roseanne
Roswell
Saved by the Bell
Scarecrow and Mrs. King
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?
Scrubs
Seinfeld
Sex and the City
Simon & Simon
Six Feet Under
Slings and Arrows
Smallville
So Weird
South Park
Space:1999
Space Ghost
Spaced
Spongebob Squarepants
Sports Night
Star Trek
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Star Trek: Voyager
Star Trek: Enterprise
Stargate Atlantis
Stargate SG-1
Starsky & Hutch
Step By Step
Strange Luck
Superman
Supernatural
Surface
Survivor
SWAT
Taxi
Teen Titans
That 70's Show
That's So Raven
The 4400
The Addams Family
The Amazing Race
The Andy Griffith Show
The A-Team
The Avengers
The Beverly Hillbillies
The Brady Bunch
The Cosby Show
The Daily Show
The Dead Zone
The Dick Van Dyke Show
The Flintstones
The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
The Golden Girls
The Hogan Family
The Honeymooners
The Jeffersons
The Jetsons
The L Word
The Love Boat
The Mary Tyler Moore Show
The Mighty Boosh
The Monkees
The Munsters
The Mythbusters
The O.C.
The Office (UK)
The Office (US)
The Partridge Family
The Pretender
The Real World
The Shield
The Simpsons
The Six Million Dollar Man
The Sopranos
The Suite Life of Zack and Cody
The Tomorrow People
The Twilight Zone
The Waltons
The West Wing
The Wonder Years
The X-Files
Third Watch
Three's Company
Thundercats
Top Gear
Twin Peaks
Twitch City
UFO
Veronica Mars
Weird Science
Wings
Whose Line is it Anyway? (US)
Whose Line is it Anyway? (UK)
Will and Grace

The amusing thing to me is that I can think of a few more shows that aren't on the list, and I added my 3 already.