I just saw one of the new The Incredible Hulk trailers, with Robert Downey, Jr.’s cameo as Tony Stark. Not bad. I’ll admit it: I’m looking forward to the movie. I’m probably one of seven people in the world – aside from Ang Lee and Louis Leterriere who liked Ang Lee’s Hulk.
As usual, I’ve tried to stay away from reading most reviews of the film. I’d prefer to draw my own conclusions.
If it’s good, great.
If not,… well…
I’m sure that it can’t be any worse than Cool World.
That’s representative of today’s weather in Salt Lake City. The forecast says that we should even break 60°F. Considering that Monday’s high was 80°F, I’m not overly enthused. I shouldn’t complain too much: SaraRules said that there was snow in Aspen this morning.
The morning has been relatively uneventful. So far.
Last night’s Scion game was fun. No one died. Correction: “No one from our group died.” A few otherwise-innocent bystanders? Well… um… oops.
Stray Toasters
called me this morning to relate the following story: She heard someone (on the radio, I believe) singing a song called If You Could Hie to Kolob…to the tune of the theme from The Beverly Hillbillies. I was intrigued by this. I looked up the lyrics and hummed the theme to myself. It worked. Beautifully, at that.
If you’re unfamiliar with “Kolob,” click here for more information.
Thanks to for pointing out the following t-shirt/bumper sticker:
I took some… creative license… with a couple of HALO 3 screenshots a few months ago, but neglected to post them:
After the meeting, Coworkers Mike and Tyranist came over to my desk to shoot the bull. In the course of conversation, Tyranist asked Mike about his new baby. Mike, not missing a beat, quipped back:
“Oh, she’s fine. Healthiest of all our children, at that age. But, you know… since she was an artificial insemination baby, we were kind of hoping for a fun, ethnic child.”
Tyranist and I both laughed – quite a bit – over this. After I regained enough composure to speak I had to ask if the kid was either half-his or half-his wife’s. He confirmed, “Oh, no. It was her eggs and my guys, but you never know. *shrug* That’s why we were kind of hoping.”
A few minutes later, and I wish I could remember exactly what led up to it, we were talking and Mike held up his right hand, clenched in a fist, and said: “Power to The Man!” Again, Tyranist and I found this amusing. And to that, I say to Mike:
Tuesday – 10 June 2008
Okay… it’s not really 4:30.
But it is 7:30.
And I’m already in the office.
We’re having an 8:00 meeting and they have breakfast here for us.
Is this to make us full and complacent and amenable to anything that comes up…?
Doubtful, but it makes my inner conspiracy theorist grin.
More later, the robot overlords protectors have provided me with a banana and a bagel.
Not that I needed any more/other reasons to love her, but SaraRules just clinched Quote of the Day with this:
SaraRules: So, it wasn’t the best idea to read what white people like, and then go to a birthday celebration of nothing but white people. Me: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH SaraRules: I’m serious. It was weird. People didn’t know who Usher was. And just curious, is it appropriate to refer to part of Michael Jackson’s career as the “when he was still black” era? Me: Politically correct, probably not. Me: Appropriate, yes. SaraRules: Yeah. Plus the site spends so much time going off about organic food, and Priuses, and people in outdoor clothing and stuff. And that’s totally where I am. Me:*snicker* SaraRules: I’m in white yuppie granola purgatory. It’s not hell yet, but you never know what the summer may hold. Me:{{{ hug }}} Me: Stay Black, love. Stay Black. SaraRules: hahahahhahaha! SaraRules: Damn. SaraRules: That was funny. SaraRules: Yeah, you win.
The audio is pretty much NSFW in 98.3% of work environments
You can watch the first… minute or so… and just skip to the 3:20 mark without missing anything.
What made this even more surreal was that a Goldfrapp’s Strict Machine (audio only) started playing on iTunes almost immediately after I was done watching the video.
I can’t complain about the weather, though.
It’s supposed to get up to the upper 70s. I can deal with that… especially since SaraRules just told me that it’s cold enough in Aspen that she had to wear a sweater this morning. In June. That just ain’t right.
I played a little CoH last night. I may switch over to CoV in the next day or two and show Mr. Dhoruba some love. Speaking of whom, I need to get a screenshot of his updated look… as well as a shot of my new Hero-side character, Kurigari.
This morning, I apparently woke up long enough to turn off the alarm… and roll back over. I don’t really , remember it, though. I was up about twenty minutes later, though. It didn’t take too long to kick the morning into gear. And the frozen mocha didn’t hurt, either.
SaraRules and kind of bonded over a common… um… “lack of bonding” experience.
Have you ever listened to Space Oddity with only one channel (right or left)? Try it sometime.
I have started trying a couple of new layouts of items in one of the display cases:
I know that this leaves a lot of empty space on that shelf, but I really like the way it accents the figure. The only better thing that I could imagine would be to have an LED in/on the figure, similar to the McFarlane HALO3 Cortana figure. I also wish that I had about a half-inch more height to work with – Galactus would look nice behind Jean.
The move went much faster than expected. I think that we were done with the lifting/shuttling in just over thirty minutes. We even got to use Forearm Forklift straps; different, but not bad. Nizlee’s folks fixed us a nice lunch in return for the elbow grease, which was very nice of them.
I had some time to kill before heading to Chris and Mary’s, so I thought I’d go by and play with the kids, since I was nearby. I called to see if she was at home; she wasn’t but said that I was welcome to stop by. And that’s exactly what I did. It’s been a few months since I’ve seen them. The biggest noticeable difference is that the fur on Presto’s lower back is developing more of an orange tint. But they’re all still very cute.
(click images for larger versions)
On to Chris and Mary’s to watch Diary of the Dead. It was a George Romero film, so of course there was a bit of commentary… but it was also a pretty good movie, too. It got a little campy for a couple of scenes near the end, but it did wrap up nicely.
Stray Toasters
“I’m Samuel. Hello.”
I picked up a pass to a sneak preview of The Incredible Hulk after the tournament yesterday. The screening is Monday night… at 7:00. I was actually looking forward to going… but then I remembered that I am going out to dinner with SaraRules’ family tomorrow evening.
Oh, well. I’ll catch the movie when it releases. So, if anyone is interested in a free pass to the movie, let me know.
I should play City tonight.
Or Marvel Ultimate Alliance.
Or go old school and play MechCommander, which I just got back from Chris.
Sunday – 08 June 2008
Last week, I mentioned going for a morning walk with , but I was too out of it Sunday morning. At Clitorati, we bandied about the idea of trying again today. said that he wanted to go to the Gay Pride parade… and I figured that we could kill two birds with one stone: Get in a walk and fly wingman for .
Great plan.
In theory.
I was up later than I had planned to be and slept in again this morning. I woke up to find that had been up working on a project until O’dark-thirty himself. I’m not sure if he wound up heading downtown or not. And I don’t know what wound up doing, either.
O, na.
In a couple of hours, I’ll be helping parents move some furniture. Nothing like some good, old-fashioned heavy lifting to kick off your day! And, I’m counting it as another (much needed) workout… of sorts. Today is also Chris’ birthday; we’re celebrating by watching a zombie movie: Diary of the Dead.
Stray Toasters
posted this video earlier. I’m sharing the love:
After watching that, I noticed that was still online, so I chatted with her for a few minutes. I may have possibly condemned her to a corner of Hell near mine as we wound up talking about dust bunnies, “cool beans” vs. “hot beans,” and the possible origins of the term “holy shit.”By
Saturday – 07 June 2008
Today is my mother’s birthday.
It is also Prince’s birthday.
I called Mom to wish her a happy birthday.
I did not call Prince.
Despite waking up late, it was a good day. There was another ‘Clix tournament at Far West today; I picked up Chris on the way to the store. I decided to try a different team, as I don’t want to become a one-trick pony with the Legion. I went with the Doom Patrol:
I know… I know… Red Arrow is not – nor has he been – a member of DP, but he filled a slot that I needed for long-range attacks.
As Fate would have it… I drew Chris as my first round opponent. Before the match even started, I was ready to chalk it up as an automatic loss. And, boy, was I right. He obliterated me. I think that I damaged one of his characters. Maybe.
Second round, I played a guy named Frank. He had a three-person team of X-related people:
I won this game… on points. Frank played a defensive game and I was able to effectively set up a pincer offense. I lost The Chief in the gambit, but I was able to take out Emma and Jean (and was working on Archangel) before time was called.
This was a good game. I kept trying to hit Physician, but his damned Super Senses let him keep dodging the attacks. Rita didn’t get close enough to do any damage. The Chief and Mento…? Well, let’s just say that they aren’t exactly damage cannons. In the end, I lost the team to attrition.
So, I was 1 – 2 for the day. On the up side, I won the “Fellowship” (think “Sportsmanship/Good Conduct/etc”) award, for which I got a Stardust figure. Stardust… Herald of Galactus. Nice! And… Chris was the big winner of the day. His prize: A spot in the HeroClix 2008 World Champioship at GenCon… with a first round bye. VERY nice!
There’s another tournament in a couple of weeks. 1,000 points… per player. Unrestricted, which means that if it’s EVER been a figure, it’s usuable. Ostensibly, this means that I could field both Galactus AND Phoenix. Of course, that would be ALL that I could field. And they would be targets. Big targets. Colossal targets, in fact.
After the tourney was over, Sean and Frank wanted to play some more, so Chris and I took them on. 400 points per player. We fielded a mixed team, as did Frank and Sean. We wound up taking out Frank’s part of their team and shortly thereafter – with most of their heavy-hitters gone – Sean conceded the game.
I stopped at Jitterbug to have a bite to eat. Uriah was there and we, along with the other folks in the shop, sat around and gabbed for a while.
From there, it was off to say “Hi” to SaraRules’ family. They were watching Amazon Women on the Moon when I got there. I had not seen it before, so they played a couple of scenes – featuring David Allen Grier as Don “No Soul” Simmons. I cracked up. Check ’em out:
And, yes, “toasterifficness” is a word.
His Chocolate Holiness has decreed it, so shall it be.
I had an interesting thought while taking a walk at lunch: I passed some flowers outside one of the buildings in our office park; some of the flowers had begun to wilt. My first thought was “Why is beauty so transitory?” I mused on it for a few moments and then had to amend the thought to: “Why is our perception of beauty – or what is considered ‘beautiful’ – so transitory?”
Somebody’s Somebody
Lish wanted me to make a note of Bacon Salt. I seem to remember that someone else (possibly or ) had pointed this out to me a few months ago.
Lish also thinks that I should audition for Top Chef… based solely on the strength of my S’mores Brownie Pie. I’m not so confident that they alone are enough to get me on – let alone through – a season of Top Chef.
I’m anxious to get my guitar back from the shop. I wasn’t really aware how much I missed having it around… until it wasn’t. Go figure.
Rowling’s Harvard Speech Doesn’t Entrance All
Wow. I was pretty amazed at some of the graduates’ reactions in this article. Want to talk about “entitlement,” check these out these quotes:
“I think we could have done better,” shrugged computer science major Kevin Bombino. He says Rowling lacks the gravitas a Harvard commencement speaker should have.”You know, we’re Harvard. We’re like the most prominent national institution. And I think we should be entitled to … we should be able to get anyone. And in my opinion, we’re settling here. “
…and…
“It’s definitely the ‘A’ list, and I wouldn’t ever associate J.K. Rowling with the people on that list,” says senior Andy Vaz. “From the moment we walk through the gates of Harvard Yard, they constantly emphasize that we are the leaders of tomorrow. They should have picked a leader to speak at commencement. Not a children’s writer. What does that say to the class of 2008? Are we the joke class?”
As SaraRules put it: “I’m sorry that probably the most published living author isn’t good enough for a CS major.” I think that the best summary to the article was this:
“They’ll grow up,” says 1983 graduate David Epstein. “They’ll have a broader worldview and they’ll understand that there are many, many ways to contribute. You know what they say — the freshman bring so much, and the seniors take away so little.”
Today’s iTunes random play has been full of Prince songs.
