Random Access

.
Moo.

Hope that you have a great day.

Goodbye, Warren Zevon.

He died in his sleep Sunday (information).
Rest in peace.

1947-2003

The final tally:

• 
  Lost, but at least made the score look respectable. Kyle Boller had a decent outing for an NFL rookie. He had his confidence shaken in the first half and that seemed to stick with him. A few more games and he should get that under wraps. But, there’s a lot of potential there. While I didn’t agree with Coach Billick’s decision to leave him in the game at first, I think that he did the right thing by keeping him in.

  I spent most of the fourth quarter on the phone with Bret. Watching the game with friends… even if they are on the other side of the country… is fun. And it’s amusing when your friends are fans of the opposing team. Oh, the trash talk. It was great. And our teams meet up for the final game of the regular season, too. That’s something to look forward to, as well.

• 
  I don’t know when or how they did it, but they lost it somewhere in the second half. They dropped this one to the Texans… by a field goal.

• 
  I didn’t watch this one, but they managed to pull out a win. *jawdrop*

Opening weekend. *nod* And, there’s still the Tampa Bay game tomorrow night.

Namaste.

So far…

• – Getting their asses handed to them.
• – Showing Houston how it’s supposed to be done.
• ….not good, either.

But, it’s football. And I’m happy, nonetheless.

Namaste.

Hmm… I didn’t get to bed until a little before 0300 and I was waking up shortly after 0830. Sure, I’m happy for the start of the season, but damn! Oh, well… in a little over an hour, my eyes will be glazed over as I watch

take on
This is usually a fun matchup because a friend of mine back home is a big Steelers fan. The trash talking usually starts about a week before the teams meet up… and it doesn’t end until a little after the final whistle blows.

Saturday recap…

• The morning started off well. I woke up, caught about 2/3 of XME before getting ready to head to the birthday party.
• The Party. Not at all bad. There were seven (7) kids. Cupcakes. Balloons. Games. Swimming pool. I didn’t have to ride herd very much; most of my duties were taking pictures. It was a veritable piece of (cup)cake. After the kids left and the clubhouse was clean, we went to Jenny’s and hung out for a few hours.
• Back home for a bit before we…
• Headed to Macaroni Grill for a birthday dinner for Sharon (Adrian’s S.O.). Good company, good food and good service made for a rather pleasant evening.
• Quick stop into Borders. Saturday nights are the nights that they typically have live music – last night was no exception. Charlie called the artist “…a wannabe Tori Amos.” It made me laugh… even more so because I like Tori’s music. One of my first reactions to watching her play:
  

  Hmm, music in the cafe….
  She’s cute…
  HEY! An iBook! stare at equipment

  Was it bad that I was more interested in the iBook and her music setup than listening to her play? *shrug*

• Bowling. I had a rather consistent high-scoring night. My warm-up game was craptastic (I think around 107), but my next-lowest score was a 149. I didn’t break 200, but I had three games that were in the neighborhood. A side bonus: Paul, a friend and former coworker, and some friends of his were there. I even bowled for a few people on his lane.
• Breakfast was good, but very quiet. The restaurant was dead last night.

And so, I wait for the last :25 before the game starts. This would probably be an ideal time to fix something to eat. And make sure that the futon is clear of all obstructions. Yep… that sounds like a game plan.

Namaste.

The day was filled with good/fun things.

Details later.
Sleep now.
Football tomorrow.

Namaste.

While at the book store this evening, I picked up a copy of Dungeon magazine, looking for a little inspiration for a new drawing. And there it was:

An ad for the Dragonlance Campaign Setting book.
::: bliss :::

I don’t really have a desire to get into a D&D campaign, but Dragonlance has been a long-time favorite of mine. I wouldn’t mind having that book just for the nostalgia and the reference information.

I went upstairs to look for the book – which I found – and I found something that provided the inspiration that I sought: The D&D Monster Manual.

The next piece that I’m working on: A drider. This will help me break away from doing mostly human figures and get into something a little different. This should be good…

Namaste.

On the way to ship some packages, I saw a bus with a sign on the side that read:

HOOTERS FOR NEUTERS

Of course, I did the obligatory double-take.

It was an ad for the Hooters restaurant chain. I really hope that they were talking about pets, because I just don’t see them being quite that progressive towards the transgendered (or in this case: non-gendered) communities.

I also hope that it didn’t mean that they were offering to turn men into eunuchs. *twitch*

Because he sends me links to things like this.

Yep. He’s a keeper.

Thursday
And so, another day is down. I left work early because ‘s mom flew in this afternoon. We took her down to Jenny’s, ‘s sister, (where she’s staying) and then went out for dinner. We haven’t seen her folks since they moved to Oregon last fall, so this will be a nice visit.

Jenny also informed me that I’m going to be in charge of supervising some of the activities at Connor’s birthday party, Saturday morning. 7 – 10 kids. And me. *grin* That’s like putting the fox in charge of the hen house. I’m not sure that she knew what she was getting into with having me do this. This will be fun.

And…. football season is officially under way. Hoo-AH! Life is good.

Song of the Day
Big Houses by emmet swimming from the CD “Arlington to Boston”

Stray Toasters

• Greetings, felicitations and good wishes to .
• Madden and Michaels. *nod*
• Tonight’s winner:
  Patrick Ramsey, the Skins’ QB, looks pretty good. He might just be someone to keep an eye on this season.

• A couple of links from various IRC conversations:
  • It was a zombie jamboree….
  • Fireworks. Hospital. That’s all I’m sayin’…
• From Slashdot: Electronic Voting: Your Worst Nightmares Are True
• Remember Joss Whedon’s Firefly, the short-lived series on Fox last year? Well, it’s coming back… on the big screen.
• Another Slashdot item: RIAA Sales Compared to Download Statistics
• First, James Bond…. and now, coming soon to a dealer near you. Maybe.

Soapbox Issue of the Day
The friendly folks at LJ have instituted a few changes. I checked the post that made about the changes. There are (as of this writing) 817 comments. Some people like it. Some don’t. That’s to be expected. For the record: I like it; I’ve been using this format for the past few months. What I didn’t expect was the number of people bitching about “how bad it is.” *sigh*

It’s not like someone is forcing you to use it. Nine Hells. Unclench! It’s just the default setting. If you don’t like it, change it to something else! I think that the thing that torqued me the most about the complaints was: The last time I checked, LiveJournal is a service. Period. It’s not a right. It’s not an obligation. Yes, there is a sense of community. Yes, it’s a good way to meet people in your area. But, let’s put this in perspective. One of the things that the admins have always touted was the ability to customize the interface. Operative word: “Customize.”

I was talking with about this earlier. She made a great comment on it:

[20:51] : i would think that more people would follow the news or lj maintenance communities ( and ) so they’d actually know what’s going on with the site.
[20:52] : i just thought about it cause i’m looking through my friend’s pages and people keep asking what’s going on with the site though, it isn’t hard to find out information.

Amen.

And with that…

Namaste.

A friend sent me the following quiz link this morning.
Twas most… interesting.

http://www.malevole.com/mv/misc/killerquiz/

My Score:

7/10
Pretty good; it seems you know
your JavaBeans from your
fava beans, your slashers from
your Slashdotters.

That’s right, kids: The season starts tonight.

Tonight’s matchup:

vs.

The ESPN pre-game show will feature Rush Limbaugh (yes, that Rush Limbaugh) and Michael Irvin joining Chris Berman and company. ABC’s “NFL Kickoff Live 2003” concert/show features: Britney Spears, Aerosmith, Mary J. Blige and others. That’s all well and fine… but, to be honest: I could do without them. The big draw for me is: Aretha Franklin; she will sing the national anthem to conclude the concert and officially open the new NFL season. Awww, yeah. Aretha makes (just about) anything alright.

And, it’s only hours away…

::: bliss :::

Wednesday
Midweek and all is well.

Song of the Day
Revolution by Aimee Allen

Stray Toasters

• It seems that I got a bit more sun on Saturday than I thought. wasn’t the only leper at work today – I’m molting. (And, no, I did not misspell that.) The top of my head is peeling. It looks like the process should be done in the next 48 hours or so. At least the color difference isn’t too extreme.
• From Time Magazine’s “What Next” issue: What’s Always Next
• The paradoxes of broadband…
• In the words of : “Doom.” Fear it. Then laugh.
• ::: This space brought to you by the friendly folks at Land’s End :::
• Chinese take-out from Sampan. That’s right. Sampan. You may now feel unbridled pangs of jealousy.
• SoulCalibur GOOOD. ::: gesture :::
  SoulCalibur II ::: covet :::
  One word: Mitsurugi.

• Identify theft story from Campbell’s Condensed Newspaper
• Check this out from ‘s journal.

Idiotstick of the Day
Another Utah driver moment. A semi was turning off of California Avenue on to Swaner Drive. In itself, that’s not too difficult… but it’s a bit narrow when a semi is turning and there are cars waiting to turn left onto California. Typically, this means that the cars are sitting in the middle of the truck’s turning radius. The trucker, in a move that surprised me, decided to wait for the cars to turn. Amazing! Unfortunately, it turned into more of a wait than he had planned on. He got impatient and decided to make the turn anyway.

(sidebar)
On the corner – at the inside part of this turn – there are some white landscaping stones… and three decent-sized landscaping boulders.
(/sidebar)

The process started off alright. The cab of the semi made the turn without a hitch. Next up: The trailer. And there’s the rub. The trailer didn’t have enough clearance on the inside of the turn. At least one of the wheels scraped one of the boulders… and punctured.

and I laughed.

And about ten seconds later, traffic had cleared enough for the cars on Swaner to turn onto California.

.eof

Namaste.

Tuesday
The start of a short work week begins… and ends. All in all, it wasn’t a bad day. After work, we had a quiet evening at home and followed it up with dessert and drinks at the V.I.

Song of the Day
My Girl by The Temptations
(and/or Bob Turk by the Temptations for WJZ-TV… from way back in the day)

Stray Toasters

• Teachers now have to make the grade….
• Soon, we may have to see how well we learned the lessons taught to us in Deep Impact and Armageddon. And Missile Command. And Asteroids. Why? Oh… just this.
• From tonight’s “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” file: I was on the phone, looking out of my office window, when I saw something rather unusual: Westbound traffic on California Avenue. That wasn’t the unusual part. In fact, it was rather run-of-the-mill. The oddity was that the vehicle leading the pack was a van… driving backwards down the street. At roughly the posted speed limit. The driver was doing a remarkable job of keeping the van in its lane. I said “What the Hell….?!” half into the phone when I saw this. I then explained to the person on the other end of the phone why I said that. He seemed to understand.
• and I took some packages to Ye Olde FedEx Centre this afternoon. While we were waiting for the clerk (not Doug) to finish processing the boxes, someone came up, placed a cooler (like you’d take on a picnic) on the counter, and left. seemed a little shocked that someone would bring a cooler to FedEx to be delivered somewhere.
  

  Me: It probably has… parts… in it.
  : *blink* *blink* Parts… like… organs?
  Me: *nod*
  : *blink* *blink*

  The clerk confirmed that, indeed, the cooler probably contained a vital organ to be rushed off to a waiting donor. The concept of shipping organs this way seemed FAR outside the boundaries of ‘s paradigm. I, on the other hand, thought that it would make a great commercial:

  ::: Fade In :::

  A man enters a FedEx center, wheeling in a large crate on a hand truck. On the side of the crate, in stenciled letters: Hammond Organ

  Another man enters, carrying an Igloo® cooler. On the side of the cooler: Vital Organ Transport

  The two men look at each other, note the other’s respective parcels and smile, knowingly at each other.

  Voiceover: Organ delivery. Big or small. FedEx. When it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight.

  ::: Fade Out :::

• I was doing random searches this evening when I came across this site. It gets style points for the name alone.
• There was an ad for a children’s game called “Gooey Louie” on Cartoon Network tonight. The premise of the game: Pick worm-like… umm… “magic nose goblins” (as Ren and Stimpy would say) from Louie’s nose; if a player picks the “wrong one,” Louie’s head explodes. *boggle* I’m not sure what to make of this…

Quote of the Day
, and I watched tonight’s episode of Samurai Jack (Episode XXVIII) “together.” Kind of. and I watched it here, s_l watched it at her place; we were all connected via AIM. Chatting with people online while watching a show can add a new dimension of entertainment to your viewing experience. During one scene, Jack and the rave kids were dancing. All of them were doing the same moves, at the same time. The IM exchange that followed made me laugh:

[20:13] : WTF!?
[20:13] : It’s a rave.
[20:13] : Raver Line Dancing!?
[20:13] : Binkey and all!?
[20:13] : *nod*

Namaste.

During a conversation about the death of Charles Bronson…

[13:32] (Todd) yeah, that suxs. not many of the old kick ass action stars left.
[13:33] (Todd) considered going to the video store and renting a deathwish marathon yesterday.
[13:36] * cracks up.
[13:36] that sucks! why couldn’t it have been walker, texas ranger?
[13:36] (Todd) or at least renting mr. majestic.
[13:38] (Todd) ‘course he was 80. not like he had made any movies recently. wonder what his last movie was.
[13:39] (Todd) then again, a deathwish in a rest home movie might have kicked ass. rolls out in his powered wheelchair, shoots a punk in the face, then goes back to have his diaper changed.

(addendum)
[16:33] deathwish in a resthome. bwahahaha. maybe the resthome could be called “deathwish”
(/addendum)

Charles Bronson (1921-2003)