Random Access

Tuesday – 08 July 2008
Last night, after having a bite to eat and watching a little TV, I decided to head to Borders to do some drawing. I took a few ‘Clix figures with me – it’s been a while since I’ve drawn anything, so I thought it best to work on simple figure studies. Did I say “a while?” I meant to say that I’ve pretty much forgotten how to do everything beyond the point of “hold the pencil.” *sigh* As the song says: It’s a long, dark road out of Hell. But, I’ll eventually get back to where I was.

Back home in time for The Middleman. Apparently, we’re on the West Coast feed of ABC Family – the show comes on at 11:00 here. Not a major hassle, but I wouldn’t mind catching it at 9 or 10. I read something… last week, I think… that says that Kevin Sorbo (Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, Andromeda) will be guest starring on an episode. He will be playing a Middleman who’s been in suspended animation. That should prove amusing.

I flipped channels for a bit after The Middleman. I started with Deep Space Nine, but wound up spending a bit of time watching The Late Late Show… before winding up back on DS9. I was mostly killing time until Burn Notice came on. Which I did. And then only made it through twenty (20) minutes of the show before realizing that I needed to call it a night.

Stray Toasters

• I made corn muffins this morning. They’re a nice change of pace to my sporadic breakfast routine.
• Ten
• Classic Nick Fury is back in comics… and has a new ‘Clix figure, to boot.



• For SaraRules and Tyranist: Zombie lawn sculpture
• Stephen Colbert is running for President of the United States… in the Marvel Universe.

(click image for more information)

• Balloon animals from trash bags: Joshua Allen Harris
• It’s a definite sign of the times when even LEGO minifigs are riding scooters.
• Builder discovers ‘priceless’ Tolkien postcard

Namaste.

I am apparently in need of a gaming session. I just went to look up part the lyrics to Manic Monday… but typed “Manic Monkday” instead. *blink blink*

Project: Rooftop has released their list of finalists from the “Superman: Man of Style” contest. I’m partial to entries #2 and #12.

Check out the DeviantArt gallery of Cat Stagg.
(, you’ll want to check out the middle of the right column on Page 5)

Doll on a Music Box/Truly Scrumptious

When did the term “jet lag” come into use?

Subnetting/Supernetting == *bleargh*

Monday – 07 July 2008
I hope that the holiday weekend was safe for everyone. As yet, I’ve heard no reports of anyone having to be
rushed to their local medical facility to have fireworks-related injuries treated. I take that as a good thing.

Aside from being slow on the uptake in figuring out that SaraRules had gotten into town early and Friday morning Leash doom, it was a rather good – and relaxing – weekend.

After SaraRules left for Aspen, I headed down to Kate and Perry’s to do a little tech support and to hang with the family. It also turns out that their youngest added +1 to his Crawl skill while they were on vacation. It also seems like he added +1 to his Stand (with support) skill, too.

When I got back home, I planted myself on the couch and watched a couple of episodes of Law & Order: SVU. I flipped over to watch a little bit of Star Wars: Return of the Jedi before deciding to play City of Heroes. I was invited to join a team fairly quickly; we ran a few missions against The Council and Tsoo… and a bank mission. Despite a few inglorious deaths, I was able to put on a couple of levels.

All-in-all, it was a good end to a good weekend.

Stray Toasters

• I am having Butterscotch Krimpets and coffee for breakfast. Not quite the so-called “Breakfast of Champions,” but good, nonetheless.
• July 7, 1936: Get a Grip – Phillips Screws Up the Toolbox
• Hulk vs. Wolverine

• The manual I’m reading just made an analogy between IP addresses and USPS addresses, that impressed me:
  

  “In the same way that a house address has two parts – a street address and a ZIP code (the city and state are not really used anymore – an IP address also has two parts…”

  The impressive part is that not many people outside the USPS really know (or at least think about the fact) that the City and State parts of an address are somewhat superfluous. As a rather high percentage of the mailstream is routed by automated systems, they can usually determine exactly where a mailpiece goes from just the ZIP Code and the street address.

• I’m going to a DCI show in Ogden on Thursday. I haven’t been to a drum corps show in… at least… 10 or 11 years. That should be fun.
• By way of the “You Can’t Do That on Television” file: Porn appears on rugby programme
  (The expression of the guy in the accompanying picture makes the whole thing for me)
• I am amused that this xkcd comic has had the following effect on the Wikipedia entry for “wood”

And… back to it.

Namaste.

Sunday – 06 July 2008
Hancock was fun. I saw it with SaraRules, Meliko and Logan. We all enjoyed it. I’m not sure why it’s been so… lukewarmly… received by critics. *ehn* Yet another reason I don’t pay a lot of heed to people who – love or hate the movie, are still getting paid to see it.

After the movie, we headed to Lollicup so that SaraRules and Meliko could get some boba tea… but they were closed. So, we went for Vietnamese instead. And it was pretty good. As we were in the greater metropolitan neighborhood, I went to Jitterbug to get a strawberry-banana smoothie. Back to SaraRules’ parents to hang out with the family – until we realized that SaraRules had left her quilt (the one she wanted to show her grandmother) back at my place.

So… back to my place to get it. And for a nap for SaraRules… which translated into Marvel Ultimate Alliance time for me. Win-Win-Win.

Back to the house for family time with the grandparents; showed up, too.

After that, we went back to my place to watch a movie before heading to breakfast. We tried to find Hellboy, but the local store didn’t have it. We wound up watching Raiders of the Lost Ark, instead. I hadn’t watched that in a long time, so it was fun to see how well it has held up after all this time.

Breakfast was good. Short, but good. And, for the first time in forever: I made a milkshake – Cookies and Cream with chocolate and caramel.

Home. Crash.

This morning, we got up and had a leisurely breakfast while listening to jazz. We went back to SaraRules’ parents’ house to see Meliko before she headed back to California.

I’m not sure what I’m doing with the rest of the day, after SaraRules heads back to Aspen, but I’m sure that I’ll come up with something.

Namaste.

Saturday – 05 July 2008
Yesterday was good and it was eventful – in a good way – too.

I didn’t wind up playing Ultimate Alliance, but that was cool.  We headed to SaraRules’ parents’ and hung out with her family for a while. Meliko and I talked comics again; I brought over House of M, because she had asked about it on Thursday. The lot of us then headed to Porcupine Pub for dinner. We came back to the house to watch Eddie Izzard: Definite Article. Until it started watching me and SaraRules.

We headed back to my place for a pre-fireworks nap… and almost slept through seeing them at all. We got up and headed up to Wasatch Boulevard, affording us a view of most of the fireworks displays across the valley. We wound up parking in Sugar House and watching their display.

Back home for some ice cream and unwinding… and then I found Blazing Saddles on TV Land! I watched about half of it before calling it a night.

Up early again this morning to head to the Downtown Farmer’s Market. I wasn’t expecting to run into anyone I know, but I did: Josh, from work. Not only did I see him, but we kept passing each other as we wandered through the park.

We’re going to see Hancock in a little while. After that… who knows?

*voop*

Friday – 04 July 2008
Happy Independence Day

Yesterday, I got off work a little after noon. I headed to Oh Sushi! to see if the lunchtime group was still there. They were. And, they were getting ready to leave. I picked up an order of Ebi and a California Roll to go.

I stopped at SaraRules’ parents’ house to see if Meliko was there; she had gotten into town Wednesday evening. She was. We hung out and talked books, movies and comics until her folks got in. I hung out with the family for a bit and then headed home.

I dropped off a few things, picked up my Pivot Driver and headed to ‘s to help with the assembly of Vikki’s bed. That went fairly quickly. I also helped troubleshoot a problem that was having with her email. And, as an added bonus: I played with the kids for a bit; I didn’t get any new pictures, though.

Next stop, Borders for a rare Thursday night Clitorati. , , OnlyAly and showed up to hang out. The people-watching was pretty choice, too. When we’d had our fill of the people there, we headed to Applebee’s to get something to eat. Land met up with us a little later.

I got a couple of text messages from SaraRules as we were finishing up dinner. She mentioned that she was having a quiet relaxing evening. I figured that she was due, given all of the running around that she’s been doing for her internship. About thirty minutes after the last message, she called. I figured that it was just our usual pre-bed, “How was your day?” call. Nope. She was calling to find out when I would be home.

*blink blink*
What?

I basically said that I should be home soon… to which she replied that she would just go to bed then and see me later.

*blink blink*
WHAT?!

And that’s when I finally managed to find two brain cells to rub together to come up with “a clue” – She had come to town a day early. My “goodbyes” and “good nights” to the dinner crew were quick. And I may have set a new personal land speed record in getting home.

Best pre-Fourth of July surprise ever.

All was fine until this morning at 8:00, when the Leash started going off about a problem in the office. I gave it a couple of minutes, to see if it would correct itself. It didn’t. I logged into the system to see what I could suss out at a glance. Problems. Yay. I called to see if he knew what was up. He didn’t, at the time, but he surmised the problem – and the solution – rather quickly. And neither of us had to actually go into the office to take care of it. Selah.

SaraRules and I ran out this morning to run a few errands and to pick up some breakfast. She is working on an article for the AMFS and I’m going to squeeze in a little time playing Ultimate Alliance, until she finishes. Then, I believe that we’re spending the afternoon and evening hanging out with her folks. Not a bad way to spend the holiday.

Stray Toasters

• I realized – and remarked to – yesterday that it must sound odd to have someone say they spent an afternoon just hanging out with their girlfriend’s sister, their ex-girlfriend and doing a favor for their ex’s sister. She laughed and said that while it wasn’t odd to her, she could see where it might sound odd to others.
• North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms passed away. He was 86.
• The emmet swimming song Hey, Jesse was about Senator Helms.
• Top 10 Famous Hotel Rooms
• Thanks to for linking me to this video:

  
  Bush Tours America To Survey Damage Caused By His Disastrous Presidency

• New Hunter S. Thompson film focuses on writings

Quotes of the Day
All of these were gleaned from last night’s dinner conversation:

• : The rubbing makes it sensitive, the sweat makes it sting.
• : What’s an “Olympic Queen?”
  Me: East German
• “So, do we need to get you some landing lights?”
• “Does he fly First Class?”
• “Crisco… the natural lube.”

Have a safe and fun holiday and/or holiday weekend.

Namaste.

Thursday – 03 July 2008
Last day of the work week… sort of. I am keeping the Leash for an extra week, so a coworker can go camping with his family. The up side to this: I’m of pager duty for the next… 8 weeks, I think. That’s not a bad deal.

Last night, I watched Star Wars: A New Hope on Spike. Sure, it was the 90s remixed edition (you know… the one where Han doesn’t shoot first), but I was able to overlook that. For the most part.

I seem to recall Luke Skywalker being known as “the last survivor of the Death Star battle.” ( I just checked with , he remembers that, too.) I also remember this being somewhat retconned:

• Han Solo (and, ostensibly, Chewbacca) was there – he afforded Luke the opportunity to make the shot.
• Wedge Antilles survived – his X-Wing was damaged in the final run on the trench and Luke told him to wave off.

So, we have three (or four) survivors there. I realized something last night and I am not sure if it’s endemic to the updated version only or not: There is a Y-Wing bomber that also flies away from the exploding Death Star:

Let’s examine that picture…

• Millenium Falcon? Check.
• Red Two (Wedge’s X-Wing)? Check.
• Red Five (Luke’s X-Wing)? Check.
• Y-Wing bombe…. wait…. Y-Wing?! What’s that doing here?!

And so, my question is: Who was the mystery pilot?

I also spent some time in Paragon City. I got Kurigari to Security Level 20 a couple of nights ago, but didn’t feel like running his costume mission then. So, I did it last night. I had another character in Icon offer to help me out. Far be it from me to turn down a helping hand. A few minutes later, I was back in the tailor shop, getting hooked up with new threads. (And I STILL need to get a picture of this character…)

Four-Color Coverage
I picked up three (that’s right, “three”) books yesterday. It made for quick, but entertaining, reading:

• Astonishing X-Men #25 – Warren Ellis and Simone Bianchi’s debut issue hits the stands. And, it’s good. The take seems to be a bit of The X-Men meets The X-Files – there is a definite sci-fi edge to the story, so far. The X-Men seem to be settling in to their new locale fairly well. They’re even on good terms with the local government. YeahbuhWHAT?! There’s even a visit from a certain wind-riding Queen of Wakanda. I must give Mr. Ellis a bit of credit for the way he handled the interaction between Ororo and Emma when Ororo asked about joining the team. If I have a problem with the book, it would be with Bianchi’s artwork… but, not for the reasons you might suspect. The art looks amazing, to be honest, but in a few cases it looks like he’s trying “too hard.” Yes, we know that the X-Men’s world is fantastic (wait, no, that’s the Four)… um… Uncanny? Extreme? New? Ultimate? Well, whatever the word is that you want to use, Bianchi seems to want to make it abundantly clear through the art. Their “car” looks like something that NASA could use for a shuttlecraft. The new X-Jet doesn’t look bad, though. Maybe his style just has to grow on me. Regardless, it was a good read and I look forward to seeing in what direction(s) Mr. Ellis takes the book.
• Legion of Super-Heroes #43 – The Legion is still facing lots of political red tape from the UP… even as they send a team to go save the newly-minted, UP-sponsored team of heroes that just had their collective recta handed to them. No rest for the weary, it seems. And who’s the kid talking with Brainiac 5 and what is his angle?
• Trinity #4 – This is DC’s latest weekly title, featuring “The Big Three,” Wonder Woman, Batman and Superman. The book is divided into two parts – the first, featuring the aforementioned trinity; the second focusing on subplots, occasionally featuring the heroes’ antagonists. Kurt Busiek presents a good take on the characters, but unless something picks up or changes in the next few issues, I may be dropping this one.

Stray Toasters

• Thank God, the angels and the Heavenly host for short work weeks.
• 33-ish
• How can you not love a webcomic that does things like this:
  • 
  • 
• Frozen mocha goodness!
• Google must divulge YouTube log
• Despite (or because of) that, I give you:

• Iron Sky. Check out the trailer.
• Inka dinka doo.

Apparently, my technopathic link extends to Defiant, as well as Nomad. After noting in the last post that I wasn’t listening to any music, I fired up iTunes. Out of the gate, I got:

• Eric Clapton – Layla (the plugged, Derek and the Dominoes version)
• The Cure – Just Like Heaven
  (…which made me wonder what a cover by the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain would sound like)
• Rockapella – Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?
  (…which, reparsed in my head as “Cartman Sandiego” – don’t picture it; no good can come of it)
• DMX – What’s My Name?
• Bob Dorough – Elementary, My Dear (from Schoolhouse Rock!)
• Janet Jackson – Nasty
  (…which made me wonder how a cover of this by Morris Day and The Time would sound)

I can’t really complain about those selections.

Stray Toasters

• Thanks to for passing along these videos
  • William Shatner for President
  • Whose Line Is It Anyway? – Prison
• For the gamer (and sugar addict) on their birthday: Pac-Man cake
• Wii Wheeton
• Mavis Staples is going to be performing in Snowmass. This weekend. Verdammt.
• And… I finished off another HeroClix card last night. This was a request from someone in the LJ HeroClix community:

Back to the grind.

Wednesday – 02 June 2008

I started to wind down a little after 1:00 last night/this morning… and it wasn’t a gradual decline, either.  It was more like a shelf edge. Seeing the signs, I got up and promptly started the end-of-the-day rituals.  I attempted to read a few pages of Snow Crash before calling it a night.  I think I read a paragraph (maybe two!) before the text degraded into indecipherable gibberish. I put the book down and went to sleep.

I vaguely remember turning off Alarm 1 this morning.  I distinctly remember turning off Alarm 2… and sprawling across the bed for what I swore would be “just a minute.” The next thing I know, there were landscapers outside my window. I checked the clock – it was well past time for me to be under way.  I was done – including a shower, brewing coffee and  a rousing game of “What Am I Going to Wear Today?!” – in just over 30 minutes. For those of you who are unfamiliar with WAIGtWT, the rules are very simple:

1. Got to your clothes closet
2. Open the door
3. Stare blankly at the clothes
4. Wait for something to magically leap off the rack and into your hand.
   (If nothing happens at Step 4, you’re doing something wrong.)
5. Walk away, to attend to some other aspect of getting ready.
6. Return to closet, to see if anything has thrown itself on the floor (or bed, if close enough).
7. Swear.  A lot.
8. Repeat Steps 4 through 7, as necessary.

So far the day looks good. I keep having the nagging suspicion that there’s something that I had tentatively scheduled for this evening… but I can’t put my finger on what it was.

Oh, well… the show must go on.

Namaste.

Mark, Wes and I headed to the gym at lunchtime. We repeated the routine that Wes and I did last week, for the most part:

• Bench Press: 3 sets/10 reps, 205 lbs.
• Flys (machine): 3 sets/10 reps, 100 lbs, with 10 sec. hold on the 10th rep
• Curls (standing, hammer): 3 sets/10 reps, 25 lbs.
• Lateral Raises (with forward extension): 3 sets/10 reps, 10 lbs.
• Tricep Extensions (standing, dumbbell): 3 sets/10 reps, 45 lbs.

Today’s post-workout weight: 175.3 lbs.

Overall, it felt good. We’re going to try to squeeze in another workout on Thursday, if possible. And, hopefully, we didn’t make Mark want to murder us… assuming that he’s able to lift his arms high enough to do so.

Stray Toasters

• Speeders to pay for police chases
• Thanks to Derek for this one: 35,310 LEGO Star Wars Clone Trooper Army Invades Earth
• By way of The Weekly Crisis
  • 10 Stories Essential to Understanding the Current Marvel Universe
  • 10 Stories Essential to Understanding the Current DC Universe
• From the “It shouldn’t be like this” file: Woman dies ignored on hospital waiting room floor
  

Back to it…

Yep… it’s been a while, but this is one of those days that requires a little extra somethin’ to keep it moving:

• Sneaker Pimps – 6 Underground
• Stevie Wonder – Uptight (Everything’s Alright)
• Erasure – Chains of Love
• The Gap Band – Oops Upside Your Head

That should help a bit.

And, as an added… um… bonus(?), tossed this my way:

…which led me to…

Groove in peace.

Tuesday – 01 July 2008
One down.
One in the chamber.
Two to go.

I think I can deal with that.

This morning, I pretty much ignored Alarm 1 and almost didn’t recognize Alarm 2.  But, a modicum of clarity worked its way into my sleep-addled brain and wrested me from The Dreaming.

Hopefully today’s work day will pass as quickly as yesterday’s.

And tonight, God willing and the creek don’t rise, is a Scion night.

Attack the day…

Monday: Coda
Tonight has been spent playing City of Heroes with MarknTyme and watching The Middleman. Both of them were terribly fun:

• City: I haven’t played a lot in the past few weeks, but I am still enjoying the time that I do get to spend in Paragon City. I put a level-and-a-half on Kurigari. I need to get a screen-cap of him.
• The Middleman: This show is just fun – a little campy, a little quirky and just… makes me smile. And laugh. And tonight’s episode even had Mark Dascascos (The Crow: Stairway to Heaven, Brotherhood of the Wolf) as Sensei Ping, teacher/trainer to Wendy… and luchadors! LOTS of luchadors.

Now, there’s DS9.

Win. Win. Win.

Namaste.

Until last night, I had forgotten that this is a short work week.  I apparently forgot it again this morning… until I started thinking about how I wanted to spread out my work hours – I was planning on working a bunch of 9- and 10-hour days and taking off early on Friday again, when it dawned on me that Friday is a freebie.  Had gone with my original plan of pulling 10-9-10, I would only have two hours of work on Thursday.  I may still do that.

Stray Toasters

• Michael Turner, artist and President of Aspen Comics, passed away Friday night.  He was 37.
• Wizard has a 6-page preview of Astonishing X-Men #25, Warren Ellis’ first issue on the title.  Page Four alone is reason enough to buy the book.
• Walk Score
• In the same vein as someecards comes WrongCards.  They even have an “In event of zombies” section.
• There are rumblings of Frank Miller working on some sort of sequel to 300.  I feel about this the way that I feel about The Dark Knight Strikes Again, his follow-up to The Dark Knight Returns:  You captured lighting in a bottle the first time around.  Don’t force it.  And, more importantly, why screw up a good thing?!
• Wizard, in their “Corps Curriculum” column, posted this picture… with the caption: “Yoda couldn’t have done it better.”  The funny thing is, you could actually overwrite Luke and Yoda’s X-Wing raising dialogue from SW:TESB on this page… and have it fit perfectly.

All that and a new episode of The Middleman tonight.

Huzzah!

and company are talking about World of Warcraft. Apparently, they had a bad run-in during one of their runs. used the word “debacle”…

…which immediately reparsed in my head to “Debacles” (DEB-uh-kleez)

…which I immediately envisioned as a Greek god: Debacles, the god of disaster and mayhem.

Shoot me now.